Nicholas Kristof writes:

If Donald Trump is elected president on Tuesday, one factor may be anger at Biden administration policies in the Middle East.

Some Arab Americans, including those in swing states like Michigan, are enraged at President Biden’s support for Israel’s wars in Gaza and Lebanon. Their taxes are paying for weapons that may be killing their relatives. A poll found Arab American support for Kamala Harris is 18 percentage points below support for Biden in 2020.

Many young people share frustration with Biden’s policy in the Middle East. So do I. Biden has supplied weapons for a war that so far has killed more than 3,000 children in Gaza under the age of 5, according to Save the Children, and he has become complicit in the starvation of civilians there.

So to those so upset about Biden’s policies in the Middle East that they are thinking about voting for Trump, staying home or voting for a third-party candidate — I understand. But don’t allow this anger to elect Trump, for that would amplify the suffering abroad that rightly upsets you. Refusing to vote may seem a noble gesture, but it’s a self-marginalization that could mean even more starving children, even more displacement and even more death.

Note that Trump has consistently been utterly uninterested in Palestinians. It was his administration that moved the American Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, that closed the Washington office of the Palestine Liberation Organization, that reversed the American position that Israeli settlements were illegal and that avoided even using the term “occupied territories” for Palestinian land.

On the war in Gaza, Trump urged: Let Israel “finish the job.” He said he had a “very nice” phone call with Benjamin Netanyahu recently, and he recounted that he advised the prime minister, “You do what you have to do.” [Continue reading…]