TRUMP VICTORYS PARKS CONCERN AMONG JEWS
Now heal divisions, leaders urge
AMERICAN JEWISH organisations have called on the US President-elect to “address the wounds of an extraordinarily divisive contest”.
The Trump campaign was widely criticised for using traditional antisemitic themes, such as attacking “global elites” for conspiring against ordinary Americans.
David Harris, head of the American Jewish Committee, urged Mr Trump to defend diversity “against any further attempts to demonise or stigmatise on the basis of ethnicity, race, gender or faith”.
In Britain, a letter signed by over 100 people criticised Board of Deputies president Jonathan Arkush for being one of the first to congratulate Mr Trump soon after his triumph was confirmed. Among other US reaction, David Bernstein, CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, which deals with relations with the wider community, called on the President-elect “to continue to assure the nation, particularly constituencies feeling most vulnerable, that the country will live up to its highest ideals and respect the rights of all people”.
Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, offered a cautious welcome, saying: “Whether it’s the Iran nuclear deal or the erosion of support for Israel in the Democrat Party, it’s clear the American people are ready to turn the page on the
ONLY ONE of the American presidential candidates has Jewish grandchildren — and he is Donald Trump, who just won a welldeserved decisive victory over his rival, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Perhaps this was because Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump’s daughter who converted to Judaism when she married Jared Kushner, visited the gravesite of the Lubavitcher Rebbe last Saturday night.
Donald Trump is committed to Israel’s security. His top national security is Lt. General Michael Flynn, who has just written a book, co-authored
with Michael Ledeen, entitled The Field of Fight: How We Can Win the Global War Against Radical Islam. The book lays out a plan for how the United States can defeat terrorism and get tough on Iran, the sponsor of international terrorism.
General Flynn has travelled the country with Mr Trump and it is expected that he will get a top national security position in the new administration.
Mr Trump wants to build up America’s defences so that other countries respect her. This would help Israel’s security as well as that of the United States.
He is against the socalled “deal” with Iran, which no country signed and which resulted in tens of billions of pounds, much of it in hard cash, transferred to Iran. Mr Trump has promised to end the “deal”, which was opposed by much of the world’s Jewish community, and take a hard stance against Iran.
The first step in fighting terrorism is calling the enemy by the correct name, radical Islamists. Due to reasons of diplomacy, or political correctness, the current administration, including Mrs Clinton, has expunged that term from its vocabulary. Yet we cannot win anything, be it a war or a game, if we do not know against whom we are fighting. Football teams spend hours getting to know the records of the individuals on the opposing teams. It’s a different game if you’re up against Chelsea or Arsenal.
Although there are no official counts, a large portion of the US Orthodox community supported Mr Trump. He respects religion and surrounds himself with advisors who have respect for religion. He is against partial birth abortion, where a baby can be killed when it is in the process of being born.
In contrast, Mrs Clinton supported the Iran “deal.” During her tenure as Secretary of State, Israeli dignitaries were not welcome at the White House. The Middle East is a far more dangerous place now than before Mrs Clinton took office.
Mrs Clinton’s closest advisor, Huma Abedin, was for 12 years on the masthead of the Journal of Minority Muslim
Affairs, a virulently antisemitic magazine. Her mother, Saleha Mahmood, is the editor-in-chief, and her brother, Hassan Abedin, is an associate editor.
Mr Trump’s support of the Jewish community is not the only reason that I worked on his campaign.
He is committed to a programme of economic reforms that will lead to faster economic growth, placing the US in a stronger position on the world stage. With a stronger economy and better defence, the United States can again set an example among nations for moral action.
As a labour economist, I am acutely aware of the pain that unemployment brings, with its gradual attrition of skills and disciplined work habits. I particularly support Mr Trump because he will reinvigorate the economy and enable the private sector to create jobs.
The global Jewish community is fortunate that Donald Trump will be the next American president, and I am honoured to have advised him.
Diana Furchtgott-Roth is an adjunct professor of economics at George Washington University and an advisor to Donald Trump’s campaign
Mr Trump’s reforms will lead to faster economic growth