On a day when Israel was responding to a terrorist-fired rocket causing personal injury to seven members of the same Moshav Mishmeret family in Central Israel, President Donald Trump and VP Mike Pence responded with history-making resolve and unquestioned support.
While 18,000 AIPAC delegates were nearby at the Washington Convention Center, the president signed a proclamation recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. PM Netanyahu then had to fly back to Israel to address this latest act of barbarism from Gaza.
The move by the Trump administration was the latest in the Republican president’s decisive actions to bolster the security of Israel and to enhance the already strong relationship between the U.S. and Israel.
We believe with all sincerity that no other administration would have this happen, even though they could have. How many of us from northern New Jersey have taken that trip to the beautiful Golan and shaken our heads wondering how Israel could even consider giving back the strategic high ground that the Syrian army at one time used to shoot down on Israeli farmers.
Later, at the Convention Center, Pence brought the bipartisan crowd to its feet several times. He rightly criticized the recent spate of anti-Semitism within the House of Representatives by saying that “anti-Semitism has no place in the Congress of the United States of America.”
He also said that “it is wrong to boycott Israel and wrong to boycott AIPAC.”
Pence perhaps got his loudest ovation from the conference participants when he said that “America and Israel are more than friends. America and Israel are family. We’re mishpacha.”
While his pronunciation of mishpacha was a little off, it certainly did not matter. Those in attendance, in fact the entire world, knew what he was talking about.
Monday was a great day for Israel and the United States. We do not know what other efforts it will take, but we hope that these few significant hours in the nation’s capital underscored that this relationship between these two nations is stronger than it has ever been. It’s certainly stronger than BDS. It is stronger than a terrorist-fired rocket from Gaza and it is certainly stronger than two misguided freshmen members of the House of Representatives.
The president has acted as we believe should have been done immediately after the Six-Day War in 1967: He officially recognized the Golan as part of the Jewish state.
And with Iran’s presence in Syria, it could mean the difference between peace and war in the future.
