White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner touted President Donald Trump’s role in bringing Israel and the United Arab Emirates together in last week’s peace deal, with Kushner hailing Trump as the top Middle East peacemaker in decades during an interview Tuesday.
Speaking with Fox News, Kushner said the Middle East “was a total mess” when Trump took office and his administration is “ending wars” and rebuilding alliances that deteriorated under past presidents. The president’s top Middle East adviser praised Trump for bringing UAE Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu together in what he said will be the first of many Arab countries reaching out to Israel. The president’s son-in-law told the network that Trump has “weakened Iran,” which has reduced terrorism funding in the region.
“This is the first peace agreement in the Middle East in 26 years and only the third peace agreement in the last 70 years with Israel,” Kushner said Tuesday, referencing the respective deals made between Israel and Egypt in 1979 and with Jordan in 1994. “This is a tremendous breakthrough and it gets Israel and the Arabs starting to come closer together and this is really thanks to President Trump’s leadership.”
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“This Middle East, you know we had people who were taking the same tired approach, the Middle East was a total mess when President Trump came in. ISIS was running wild, Iran was funded through that terrible deal and they were on their way to a nuclear weapon and they were funding a lot of terrorists throughout the region who were destabilizing things,” Kushner continued.
“President Trump has taken down the Islamic State territorial caliphate, and he’s weakened Iran which has lessened the amount of money they have to send out to their proxies,” Kushner added. “He has brought unusual countries together around shared opportunities.”
Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade highlighted how Trump has facilitated many Arab countries “coming out of the closet, admitting they have relations with Israel.” Kushner also pushed back on Democratic National Convention speakers and critics from the 2016 presidential election who said Trump would destroy the alliances of the United States across the globe.
“President Trump has rebuilt alliances and he’s ending the wars previous politicians have started, he believes in putting America first—he wants to bring our troops home, he wants our military to defend America and we have trade deals which benefit the American worker and not shipping our jobs overseas,” Kushner said.
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“At the end of the day, regardless of what your faith is, President Trump knows that all human beings want to have a better life, they want to economic opportunity and they want to have security,” Kushner added. “Thanks to the trust President Trump has built over the last few years, more and more countries are coming together.”
Newsweek reached out to the White House for additional remarks Tuesday morning.
