Arab Americans eye Trump’s pro-Israel government picks
Deutsche Welle :
It has been several weeks now, but Wasel Yousaf has photos on his phone to help him relive the memory of meeting his idol.
“He made a joke about how tightly I was shaking his hand,” Yousaf said, looking at an image of his introduction to then-presidential candidate Donald Trump, surrounded by Arab American supporters in Dearborn, Michigan.
Since then, the candidate has become the president-elect, buoyed especially in this state by voters like Yousaf, a coordinator for the state’s chapter of Arab Americans for Trump.
There was a time when Trump was not a harbinger of hope for Arab Americans or Muslim Americans. Shortly after taking office in 2017, he signed an executive order banning foreign nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States, a move his critics called his “Muslim ban.”
During the 2024 presidential campaign, he said he would reinstate the travel ban and expand it to “ban refugee resettlement from terror-infested areas like the Gaza Strip.”
The conflict in the Middle East and disillusionment with President Joe Biden’s administration brought many Arab American voters to the polls in Dearborn, which has the proportionally largest Muslim population of any city in the United States.
Many said they were disappointed in Biden’s failure to rein in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza after Hamas resistance campaign on Israel killed about 1,200 and saw 250 people taken hostage.
The resulting war has caused over 45,500 deaths in Gaza, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-led Gaza Strip. Israel, Germany, the United States and several other countries designate Hamas as a terrorist organization.
“Most of the diverse community of Arabs here are [tied] to their roots and homeland. So, they’re looking for peace. Trump’s campaign signaled peace through strength,” said Yousaf.
“It leads us to hope for a finish to all the wars around the world in Ukraine, Gaza, Yemen and now in Syria.”
In his first sit-down interview since the election, aired on December 8 with NBC’s “Meet the Press” program, Trump was pressed on whether he would pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to end the war in Gaza.
“I want him to end it, but you have to have a victory,” Trump said, a nod to Israel winning the war on its own terms. During the campaign, Trump promised peace in the Middle East but offered no clear plan for how to achieve it.