Donald Trump is offering his support for Israel to continue new construction of settlements in the West Bank.
“[I] think Israel should have, they really have to keep going. They have to keep moving forward,” the Republican presidential candidate said in an interview with the Daily Mail published Tuesday. “No, I don’t think there should be a pause.”
Trump explained his reasoning had to do with the continued violence by Palestinians.
“Missiles were launched into Israel, and Israel, I think, never was properly treated by our country. I mean, do you know what that is, how devastating that is?” he said in the interview conducted Monday. “Who would put up with that? Who would stand for it?”
Earlier this year, Trump said he would the remain the “neutral guy” in the Israel-Palestinian conflict to help negotiate a peace should he win the White House. He expressed again in the new interview that he would “love to negotiate peace.”
“But I mean lasting peace, not a peace that lasts for two weeks and they start launching missiles again. So we’ll see what happens,” Trump said.
Trump also offered support of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, while taking a small jab at President Obama.
“I don’t know him [Netanyahu] that well, but I think I’d have a very good relationship with him,” Trump said. “I think that President Obama has been extremely bad to Israel. And I don’t even understand where – I have Jewish friends that support Obama. I tell them all the time, I say, ‘What are you doing? The Iran deal is a disaster for Israel.'”
Trump had a trip to Israel planned in December, but cancelled it after Netanyahu criticized his call to ban Muslims from entering the United States.
