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A specter is haunting America First—the specter of Israel.
America’s unconditional support for Israel has intensified since Donald Trump returned to the White House—compromising the MAGA movement in the process.
Consider a contradiction that emerged during Vice President J.D. Vance’s interview this Sunday on Fox News. Vance said the U.S. was done funding Ukraine’s war effort and implored European nations that profess to care about the conflict to own it. So far, so MAGA.
But when the conversation turned to Israel, Vance’s ideology seemingly turned along with it. After host Maria Bartiromo asked about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plans to take over Gaza, Vance responded: “Well, ultimately that’s open to Benjamin Netanyahu.” The vice president then listed ways the U.S. would continue backing Israel’s war effort while also cleaning up its mess.
America First conservatives have historically seen Europe as a civilizational ally and Israel as a liability (just check out the writings of Patrick Buchanan, cofounder of this magazine). So, why does Vance often call out America’s Western allies while never giving the same treatment to Israel? Because Israeli interests, not American ones, drive U.S. policy in the Middle East.
Or consider Trump’s most important campaign promises. Trump pledged to crack down on illegal immigration, bring back U.S. manufacturing through tariffs, and avoid wars that don’t serve the national interest.
Each of these policies has been either perverted or abandoned for the sake of Israel.
On immigration, the Trump administration has arrested and sought to deport lawful residents for criticizing Israel. Immigration and Customs Enforcement reportedly paused investigations into human trafficking and drug smuggling so that agents could surveil the internet activity of pro-Palestinian college students. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services screens immigrants’ social media posts for signs of antisemitism—surely including expressed hostility to Israel—when considering applications for green cards.
Most Americans understand the moral logic of mass deportations—if you broke the law by coming or staying here, then the U.S. cannot abide your continued presence—but many can’t comprehend booting lawful residents for their stance on a foreign nation in a region of diminishing strategic significance for the United States.
As for trade protectionism, Trump threatened to scuttle a trade deal with Canada because of its decision to recognize the state of Palestine. An America First trade policy would mean striking deals and setting tariff rates according to the material interests of Americans, not the wishes of a small country on the other side of the world. It certainly wouldn’t involve turbocharging tensions with America’s northern neighbor—a peaceable neighbor and reliable ally, no less—to punish sovereign actions deemed unacceptable to a faraway non-ally.
Foreign policy restraint is also out the window. From March to May, the U.S. conducted a massive aerial and naval campaign against Yemen’s Houthi militants. In June, Trump ordered devastating strikes on Iran. In both cases, the targets were Israeli adversaries. Meanwhile, the U.S. has continued bankrolling Israel’s brutal assault on Gaza and its slow-motion ethnic cleansing in the West Bank, damaging America’s reputation, risking blowback in the form of Islamic terrorism, and rendering impossible the two-state solution on Israel–Palestine that Washington long has advocated.
The first half of “realism and restraint” has also been discarded. During the 19th and 20th centuries, hard-nosed realism guided the U.S. to secure hegemony in the Western Hemisphere and then to prevent any other state from dominating its own region. But in the 21st century, the U.S. is not only clearing the way for “Greater Israel” in the Middle East but doing so at the expense of countering China in the Asia Pacific. Beijing must look at every munition sent to Israel as one withheld from Taiwan, which it hopes one day to annex.
Less prominent planks of the MAGA platform have also been downgraded for reasons pertaining to Israel.
Trump promised to dismantle “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” an implicit vow to level the playing field for white Americans in job applications and university admissions. He has taken important steps toward that goal—but has also, at the behest of the Israel lobby, expanded DEI protections for Jewish students.
On the campaign trail, Trump lambasted the Democrats for their feeble response to wildfires on the west coast and Hurricane Helene on the east coast. But earlier this month, the Federal Emergency Management Agency announced it would deny funds to states and cities that boycott Israeli companies. (FEMA later walked back the announcement, though the outrageous policy appears to remain.) Californians and New Yorkers are free to boycott red states that keep males out of girls’ bathrooms and sports leagues—but they had better not boycott Israel.
As for free speech, Vance has taken European leaders to task for censoring conservative views—but he’s looked past Europe’s crackdowns on criticisms of Israel. The United Kingdom in July banned the protest network Palestine Action and on Saturday alone arrested hundreds who protested against the authoritarian move. Vance uttered not a peep on that subject during a trip this weekend to the UK.
To be sure, the Trump administration has accomplished much. The president has closed the border and waged a ferocious attack on DEI. He may now be on the verge of resolving the Ukraine war, with Putin agreeing to meet with him on Friday in Alaska. Tariffs, of course, need time to shore up manufacturing, but Trump’s sweeping levies haven’t produced the economic calamity that globalists warned about. And Trump wisely confined the attack on Iran to a one-night bombing raid and then pushed for Israel to halt its own attacks on that country.
But real MAGA conservatism still hasn’t been tried, and America’s persistent, vast, and historically unprecedented support for Israel is, at present, the reason why.