Chief Executive Sheldon Adelson addresses the media during the grand opening ceremony of the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore.
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Donald Trump delivered an erratic speech in front of the Republican Jewish Coalition, getting booed towards the end of his remarks on Thursday afternoon in Washington D.C.
“All of us are deeply concerned that this is yet another manifestation of terrorism, radical Islamic terrorism here at home”, the Texas senator told the meeting of the Republican Jewish Coalition. Palestinians want East Jerusalem, which Israel captured in the 1967 Six-Day War, as the capital of their country.
“Stupidly, you want to give me money…you’re not going to support me because I don’t want your money”. “You’re not going to support me because I don’t want your money”, Trump told a full auditorium of Jewish donors and Republican Jewish supporters. “I don’t know whether or not they want to go that final step, you know, and that’s going to be up to them”.
“I will actually be using a script”, he announced before he began his speech.
At the RJC, he implied he would not win the Jewish vote in the Republican primary, which he now leads, because he is not seeking donor funds.
Adelson’s willingness to make a huge political investment helps explain why his signature group has attracted all of the major GOP presidential candidates to its forum in Washington – even though the man himself wasn’t among the hundreds in attendance.
Trump backtracked on comments that he made Wednesday in which he suggested that Israelis could sacrifice more than they had already for the sake of peace.
Several U.S. presidents in both parties have tried to broker a peace accord without success.
The crowd – many of them early Bush supporters – laughed, sometimes amused, sometimes uncomfortable.
“Israel has given a lot, and a lot of people don’t know that”, he said.
Trump shrugged off the criticism. Perhaps more than any other candidate, he can afford to. Compared to his rivals, he has raised – and spent – dramatically less, depending largely on free publicity to drive his campaign.
Unlike candidates who spoke before him, Trump refused to say that he would oppose any efforts to redivide Jerusalem. At the heart of his campaign is Trump’s argument that his experience in business and real estate would prepare him for negotiations with world leaders. But Israel has not been given the credit that they deserve for what they’ve done, I will say that.
Trump also touted his past support from the Jewish community.
Reaction to Trump’s comments came quickly on social media.
“You just like me because my daughter happens to be Jewish”, Trump said. Even so, his support for Israel is unquestioned, he said.
Clinton, the Democratic presidential frontrunner, has promised to fix US-Israel ties that have been badly frayed under Obama, and wrote last month in an op-ed piece in the American Jewish publication The Forward that one of her first moves as president would be to send a White House invitation to the Israeli prime minister. “He should know better, and probably does”. “You invest in a young guy – he’s a USA senator – from Florida, and he’s in there about 12 seconds and decides he wants to run for president”, Trump said. “We have a very good relationship”.
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“He has no plans now, or in the immediate future, to get involved in the primary”, Abboud said.
