Israel has a highly effective lobby in the United States, one that covers both political parties. Religion, arms business interests, and geostrategic considerations shape these pressure groups, which are very active in Congress and impossible for any president to ignore. Israel’s security is an American imperative.
What happened in Gaza has affected Israel’s image among a certain segment of American opinion, but it has not shaken the core of the commitment between the two countries. The Jewish lobby, riding the fight against antisemitism, remains strong in the legislature and in the media (as well as on social networks).
With Syria and Iraq blocked and the Gulf countries in a state of anxiety over Iran, Israel dreamed that Trump would turn it into the region’s dominant power of the future. There was, however, the “détail” of the Palestinians—whom many in Israel do not regard as “people,” but whose existence the "Arab street" forcefully reminds them of.
Netanyahu may be unpopular, but his policies toward the Palestinians and Iran are highly popular. That is not where his downfall will come from. The massacre of Palestinians does not morally divide Israeli society. Yet, across the world, after Gaza, the memory of the Shoah no longer carries the same emotional weight.
In the short term, the key question is how Netanyahu will manage to balance his obsessive ambition for a powerful “Greater Israel” with Trump’s desire to strike a deal to end a war far more difficult to win than Netanyahu had promised him.
If Netanyahu were to risk openly defying Trump and causing him to lose face, he would face a problem. All indications suggest, however, that the Israeli prime minister knows how far he can stretch the rope, always “respecting” the megalomaniacal narcissism of his American ally. Lebanon will be a good test.
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