Jared Kushner meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem (Photo GPO)
The Jared Kushner revelations are like a gift that keeps on giving. Now we learn that Donald Trump wanted to “dump” Benjamin Netanyahu because the former Israeli Prime Minister was not grateful enough to him. The husband of Ivanka Trump makes the revelation in his upcoming new book “Breaking History: A White House Memoir,” which is due out on August 23.
Where to begin?
Well, Jared Kushner has revealed that the then US ambassador to Israel David Friedman promised then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the American government would support Israel should it move forward with a plan to formally annex all of the West Bank, or at least the areas there controlled by Israel. Unfortunately, President Trump never agreed to this.
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This happened in 2020 when the negotiations for the Abraham Accords – peace between Israel and the two Arab Gulf states the UAE and Bahrain – was still being negotiated. The publicized plan for annexation almost torpedoed the Accords as the Arab states made it clear that they would not move forward with the peace deal should Israel make any annexations.
This caused the American government one big headache that it did not need.
David Friedman continues to deny this, but Jared Kushner writes in his book, “As it turned out Friedman had assured Bibi that he would get the White House to support annexation more immediately. He had not conveyed to me or anyone on my team.”
Jared Kushner says that he spoke with Friedman at the time explaining, “Our conversation got heated and I pulled out the plan from the folder on my desk. ‘Where does it say that in here?’ I asked. ‘It doesn’t say that here. You are one of the best lawyers in the world. You know that’s not what we agreed to.”
“Behind the scenes, our relationship with the Israeli government had reached its lowest point to date. I felt like I was trying to move the Israelis forward and build partnerships with the broader world while they were stuck on internal politics,” Kushner.
After Benjamin Netanyahu announced his annexation plans, Trump went so far as to consider throwing support behind Netanyahu’s main rival at the time – Blue and White Party Leader and former IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz.
“I couldn’t believe it. Trump was still fuming over Bibi’s speech. In fact, he had asked me whether he should take the unusual step of endorsing the prime minister’s political rival, Benny Gantz,” writes Jared Kushner in his book.
“Had I walked twenty feet [from his office] down the hall to the Oval and asked Trump to go forward with annexation, the president would have thrown me out,” writes Kushner.
But, what must have been the biggest insult in the eyes of Donald Trump was what he perceived to be Benjamin Netanyahu’s failure to adequately show appreciation for the American decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capitol.
When told of Trump’s decision Netanyahu reportedly responded by saying, “If you choose to do that, I will support you.” For a man like Trump this was an insult.
Later on, Jared Kushner writes, Trump even told Netanyahu, “Bibi, I think you are the problem.”
After the 2020 elections Donald Trump declared that Netanyahu was a bad person because the then Israeli prime minister acknowledged that President Joe Biden had won, as Trump was still calling the election stolen.
