Gaza War under Trump: It’s More MIGA than MAGA

The global media’s spotlight is on the Republican Party Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and the aftermath of last Saturday’s assassination attempt on Donald Trump, the Republican Party’s presidential candidate.

In the meantime, the killing of Palestinians in Gaza disappeared from the news bulletins. On Western TV channels, the Gaza deaths warranted not even a mention on the bottom scroll bar in the past few days, although hours before the assassination attempt, nearly 100 Palestinians, including children, were killed by genocide-committing Israel during an attack on a displacement camp in Gaza’s Al Mawasi area, a so-called Israeli-designated safe zone. The attack site was spattered with body parts of children, who, according to Israel’s war doctrine, need to be eliminated before they grow up to take up arms against Israel.

Yet the Western media continued with their spotlight on Trump and his vice presidential pick, J. D. Vance, a Trump critic turned Trump admirer. He once called Trump an American Hitler and an a**hole. The 39-year-old Ohio Senator’s elevation to the VP candidate position only confirms the power of the Israeli lobby. He is a candidate endorsed by the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the all-powerful Jewish lobby that invests hundreds of millions of dollars in US politicians to ensure their victory and control US foreign policy. His pro-Israeli stance betrays the troubled life he recounts in his best-selling memoir, Hillbilly Elegy. A Zionist, he supports Israel’s war on Gaza and has criticised the Biden administration’s limitations on military aid to Israel.

Worth mentioning is another recent incident that highlighted AIPAC’s control of US politics.

Three weeks ago, the Democratic Party’s popular candidate, Jamaal Bowman, lost the primary for New York’s 16th district to an AIPAC-backed candidate. Bowman is a powerful voice in the Democratic Party’s progressive segment, which criticises Israel’s war on Gaza and stands for a free Palestine. AIPAC spent millions of dollars to ensure Bowman’s defeat. Though the Democratic Party’s progressive heavyweights, such as Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Contez, campaigned for Bowman, the Zionist money power prevailed, underscoring that in the US, it is not the people who elect presidents and Congress members but rather the Jewish lobby.

This prompted angry progressives to write a tough letter to the Democratic Party leadership, expressing their “dire concerns” over the party’s continued association with AIPAC.

In the 1960s, Democratic Party candidate John F. Kennedy confided in one of his close friends that he felt humiliated when, at a dinner meeting, the Israeli lobby elders wanted to buy him over. They suggested they would give him money to campaign, provided that once he became president, he should let the Israeli lobby dictate his Middle East policies. Kennedy vowed to enact legislation to ban such interference by interested lobbies once he became president. But before Kennedy could take such steps, he was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald, who was killed by Jack Ruby, who died in prison custody of pulmonary embolism. Though the case was closed, there has been no end to theories as to who killed Kennedy. An Israeli-led conspiracy is the strongest of these theories, as Kennedy vehemently opposed Israel’s secret programme to develop nuclear weapons.

Just like the Kennedy assassination, the attempt on Trump’s life has triggered many questions to which the US law enforcement authorities have yet to provide convincing answers. The Pennsylvania incident has an eerie parallel with the movie “The Day of the Jackal.” In the movie based on Frederick Forsyth’s political thriller, French President Charles de Gaulle bends his head slightly to garland a medalist and survives the bullet fired by the would-be assassin from a nearby building. Trump tilted his head to the left while addressing a political rally as the bullet whizzed past him.

Trump has many enemies. He opposes US military and financial support for Ukraine in its war against Russia. The US has pledged US$175 billion for Ukraine. Of this amount, US$107 billion has been disbursed. The sudden end to the Ukraine war or a victory for Russia during Trump’s presidency is not to the arms lobby’s and the war party’s liking.

Also, a major concern of Trump’s opponents is Project 2025, a policy document prepared by the Heritage Foundation. Most of its authors are Trump’s supporters. In the late 1990s, hawkish US President George W. Bush endorsed a document prepared by the think tank Project for the New American Century, and it led to the US wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.

Project 2025, among other matters, includes proposals to dismantle federal agencies like the FBI, eliminate the Department of Education, ban abortion drugs nationwide, and repeal the Affordable Care Act. Biden has publicly condemned Project 2025, saying it would destroy America. Trump says he disagrees with only some of its proposals, though he claims he has nothing to do with the project.  Given his eccentric demeanour and maverick politics, Trump, once ensconced in office, will go after all those people who he suspects played a role in what he calls the ‘witch hunt’ to put him behind bars. He will hit back. There is little doubt about it.

In the meantime, signalling that there is no respite in Israel’s genocide in Gaza, more attacks followed Saturday’s massacre, targeting United Nations-run schools and facilities. Since Saturday, more than 200 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks, while world attention has been fixed on America. 

Emboldened by such apathy, Israel continues its genocidal mission to turn the entire Gaza Strip into the world’s largest graveyard. More than 186,000 Palestinians—more than 7 percent of Gaza’s 2.5 million population—have been killed in the Gaza genocide, according to the prestigious British medical journal, The Lancet. Israel is unperturbed by such shocking revelations by independent researchers, the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants, which are likely to be issued in the coming weeks, or the World Court’s ruling on South Africa’s petition to stop the Gaza genocide. 

With Biden suffering from cognitive issues connected to geriatric conditions and coming under pressure from many Democratic leaders, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, to step down as a candidate, Israel should be elated over the growing certainty of a Trump victory. Trump has said he will let Israel complete the Gaza job, meaning he has Israel’s back. 

It was Trump, during his first term, who gave legitimacy to Israel’s illegal annexation of East Jerusalem, which is an internationally recognised Palestinian territory, and Syria’s Golan Heights. He then shifted the US embassy to Jerusalem, recognising the city as Israel’s undivided capital. More Israel-appeasing acts are likely during his second term. 

The Middle East is likely to see more tension. The Trump-Vance administration is likely to ratchet up the pressure on Iran. Vance is Iranophobic. He has been an advocate of a military response against Iran and has hailed Trump’s order to eliminate Iran’s high-profile Revolutionary Guard Commander, Qassem Sulaimani. Israel cannot be happier.

So it is more MIGA (Make Israel Great Again) than MAGA (Make America Great Again).