Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu downplayed reports of a potential rift with President Donald Trump on Sunday, re-establishing Israel and the United States as each other’s greatest ally.
“I don’t think there’s a rift,” Netanyahu told Jacqui Heinrich on Fox News’ “The Sunday Briefing.” “I think America has no greater ally than Israel, and Israel has no greater ally than the United States.”
“President Trump is the leader of the United States, he does what’s good for America; I am the leader of Israel, the one and only Jewish state, I do what’s good for Israel,” he further noted. “Ninety-nine percent of the time we see eye-to-eye.”
With that said, Netanyahu did admit he was concerned about the average young American’s current opinion towards Israel, considering its international relations with other countries like Iran, Lebanon and Palestine at the moment.
“I worry about the trends that I see, I won’t tell you that I’m not worried about it. I think it has something to do, frankly, with social media, with the penetration of social media that has been used and abused by countries, three in particular. They had bot farms that push the stuff against America and against Israel, and it focuses on young people and young Americans, and I can’t say that I’m not worried about the effect that it has,” he explained. “How do you combat this? It’s hard, because democratic countries don’t have the ability to fight this bot war with the same means. We are accountable, we’re transparent. It’s not so simple.”
“I think you’ll see a correlation between the penetration of certain social media and the decline in patriotic American feelings and support for Israel. It’s something we have to deal with, but am I worried about it?” Netanyahu continued. “Look, I think that our alliance is not merely based on common interests; I think it’s based on common values, and as long as we stick to those common values — freedom, the right of every individual to live and not be slaughtered by fanatics, people should have free choice in their lives — and, of course, to have our common heritage, which has brought so much to the world.”
“It concerns me that there’s that element of anti-Israel, first of all, in the Democratic Party and then the woke Right. I’m concerned with that, and to the extent that we can do something to mend it, obviously, I’ll do it,” he added. “I think there’s a process taking place in America, which you probably know better than me, of questioning America’s traditional values and going to many places that, I think, challenge not only our alliance, but they challenge the traditional values that formed the basis of each of our countries. I hope that’s not something that is going to proceed, I hope America changes direction.”
Still, the world leader said he doesn’t foresee this “toxic ideology” lasting forever.
“I want to wish you and the people of America a happy Fourth of July. 250 years of freedom, and frankly, 250 years of defending freedom. America has been a stellar force in this century, and in the past one. In modern times, if you hadn’t had America, you would have Nazi totalitarianism, Stalin totalitarianism, and others, and I think America has been a great force for good,” Netanyahu concluded. “That doesn’t mean that it’s perfect, Israel is not perfect either, but it has been a force for immense good, and our alliance has been a terrific one and it will continue to the extent that I have anything to do with it. And the people of Israel, who are unabashedly pro-America.”
