What's happening in Israel and Gaza right now: Trump's foreign policy in the Middle East—for 4 years—was to get the Palestinians' allies to abandon them in favor of allyship with the US and Israel against Iran. Trump/Kushner wanted Gaza *desperate*. This is what that has wrought.

Pre-Trump, the promise of a 2-state solution remained. The Palestinians felt they could lose Arab allies if they launched a huge assault on Israel. Trump/Kushner removed those blocks on the assumption America would turn against the Palestinians if they did what they're doing now.

Essentially, this was a trap set by Trump—or, if you like, a time bomb dropped on Biden's doorstep. Trump's goal was to increase the temperature between Israel and the Palestinians to the point where conflict was inevitable—with the US feeling compelled to take the Israelis side.

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is of course decades old. What I'm referring to is the circumstances created between 2017 and 2021 that generated *this* assault on Israel from Gaza and Israel's predictably excessive response. Trump wanted this to come to a head.

One of the reasons Netanyahu illegally aided Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, a crime for which he will never face any punishment, is that with his legal troubles and his political troubles he wanted and needed exactly what Trump did: for things to blow up in the Middle East.

Obviously both Israel and the Palestinians must take responsibility for their actions—but this latest fire was stoked by Trump, Kushner, and Netanyahu because it served their purposes. And I spent a year writing a book on this so that I could write a thread like this responsibly.

Geopolitically, the Palestinians have nothing to gain by firing hundreds of rockets at low altitude into southern Israel. My point is...that's the point. Trump created the circumstances in which the Palestinians would have nothing to lose—so that something like this would happen.

The Palestinians have now walked into this Trumpian trap, though understandably, given the desperate nature of their circumstances—now that they have no allies. Meanwhile, Netanyahu's government helped *set* this trap, which is why I have no sympathy for its position whatsoever.

I continue to see this chess game being played by Netanyahu—with Trump's foreign policy—as one that harms both the Israeli people and the Palestinians. I would not call Palestinian leadership good actors per se, but Netanyahu is one of the most vile men on the face of the planet.

When Trump announced his so-called "peace" deals with various Sunni Arab nations, I and many others said that the deals would lead to violence and war. That's one of the premises of my 2019 Macmillan book, Proof of Conspiracy. Sadly, this seems to be how things are unfolding.

Trump was (and is) a con man. His foreign policy was a con. Every action he took was to create the short-term *appearance* of a victory so that he could gain reelection. He knew that far-right media would never look beyond the end of its nose—which at the time was up Trump's ass.

Trump and Kushner both knew that these so-called peace deals would wrongly punish a country (Iran) that had been complying with the nuclear deal the whole world negotiated with it, even as they would systematically and dangerously isolate the Palestinians from their Arab allies.

What was in it for Trump/Kushner? Real estate deals in the UAE. Real estate deals in Saudi Arabia. Illicit election aid from the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Israel. Real estate deals in Israel. Significant campaign donations via Sheldon Adelson. Support from evangelicals—and much more.

If you're responding to this thread by noting—as I've already noted—that this conflict is decades old, and are not acknowledging that Trump dramatically changed US policy in the Middle East in a way that led to the events of today, with due respect you have tunnel vision on this.

Biden hasn't yet instituted a coherent Middle East policy, as he's been focused on the pandemic, the economy, voting rights and infrastructure. So the moral universe we're operating in in the Middle East—as a nation—is the one that Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu constructed.