The US, Israel, Palestine, and Mahmoud Khalil

By Uditha Devapriya

If last year proved anything, it was that given a choice between international law and domestic pressures, the US political establishment will give way to the latter. Hence the Democrats, led by Kamala Harris, articulated the need for a two-state solution for Palestine and Israel – Harris spoke vaguely of the Palestinians’ right to their own future and land – yet belied it all by promoting Israel’s right to self-defence.

One can argue that Joe Biden, easily the most pro-Israel of recent Democratic US presidents, set the stage for this situation. But it was taken to its logical conclusion by Harris and her campaign. Barring a few exceptions like Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, who were badmouthed by Democrats and demonised by Republicans, there was very little condemnation of Israel’s violations of international law in Gaza and the West Bank – violations which continue today and have accelerated because of the sense of impunity that Jerusalem was bound to receive under a hardcore, right-wing Republican administration.

The situation has worsened since then. But in trying to make sense of what has happened, I think we are trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.

The Trump administration operates on a logic of its own, and any attempt to make sense of it or rationalise it, to justify it or counter it, would be rather fruitless. For instance, it came to power on a platform of “absolute” free speech. Those who contend that this contradicts the government’s crackdown on pro-Palestinian students and intellectuals should realise that Trump and his supporters have reserved for themselves the power to define and set limits on such abstractions.

When Vice-President Vance, in his remarks in Munich last month, implied to his European audience that the region should be more tolerant of free speech, we need to understand that Vance’s, Trump’s, and the modern-day Republican Party’s framing of free speech differs from the ideals of the Enlightenment. This free speech is unquestionably right-wing and politically incorrect. Thus Trump, speaking to reporters during a meeting with the Irish Prime Minister, stated that Chuck Schumer, one of the most pro-Israel Senators and the highest-ranking elected US Jewish official, had “become a Palestinian.”

On the face of it, this was a slur, and Democrats and Jewish advocacy groups – including the Anti-Defamation League – were quick to point it out. Yet to try holding Trump to account over such remarks would be to hold him up to standards neither he nor his administration feel are applicable to them. When the White House, namely the President’s press secretary, speaks of USD 50 million of US foreign aid being diverted to “fund condoms in Gaza”, one is either outraged or intrigued enough to know more, particularly when someone like Elon Musk amplifies it on his platform. Yet when, weeks later, at a White House briefing attended by Elon Musk and his son, Musk backs away and admits that “some of the things that I say will be incorrect”, they are both investing themselves with a sense of invincibility and passing the onus of proving them wrong to the journalists and media that they themselves accuse of being biased against them.

In other words, the Trump administration is having the cake and eating it too – rather apt, considering how it prides itself on its disruptiveness, its sense of chaos. As far as Israel and Palestine is concerned, of course, there is no ambiguity: this is without a doubt the most pro-Israel administration in recent US history, and there is hardly any US official who would beg to differ with Israel’s actions.

While right-wing commentators like Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens have spoken sympathetically about Palestinians – with Carlson decrying Israel’s activities and Owens questioning why US policy is kowtowing to Israel and Zionism – they are the golden exception to the dismal rule. Even Ann Coulter, the grande dame of US conservative politics, who infamously told Vivek Ramasamy to his face that she would not vote for him because he was Indian, questioned whether arresting student activists without proof of crime would infringe on First Amendment rights.

That sentiment has been echoed elsewhere. The arrest in question, of Mahmoud Khalil, has provoked much disgust and revulsion. Set against the backdrop of its gutting of foreign aid, scholarship, and exchange programmes, the Trump administration is now framing citizenship in the US as a privilege, not right. One can counter this by stating that immigration to the US, and gaining citizenship there, was never easy. But beyond any other administration in recent memory, Trump and his fellow-travellers have succeeded in both accusing previous governments of relaxing immigration rules and letting criminal elements in and weaponizing immigration law to achieve its domestic and foreign policy agenda.

To their credit, the Democrats while in power never went beyond arresting protestors – though that in itself raised eyebrows and had implications for civil liberties and freedoms. Perhaps because they saw themselves as the “party of rights”, they were careful, even within the restricted space they were operating in, not to invoke every other law and interpretation of it in the way the Trump administration is doing now.

It is becoming clear that Donald Trump is aligning his foreign policy with his domestic agenda – and that Israel, which has since at least the 1970s become a crucial part of that agenda, has taken centre-stage in a way Ukraine and Russia have not. For better or worse, this will define the course of US domestic politics and foreign relations for the next five years, and it will meet with the resistance of US courts and judges, every time the administration invokes laws and legal provisions to achieve its America First agenda.

Uditha Devapriya is a regular commentator on history, art and culture, politics, and foreign policy who can be reached at udakdev1@gmail.com. Together with Uthpala Wijesuriya, he heads U & U, an informal art and culture research collective.