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Foreign Affairs The American ‘Passionate Attachment’ to Israel Israel pursues its own interests; can America? (Photo by JASON REDMOND/AFP via Getty Images) President George Washington warned in his timeless Farewell Address: A passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to others, which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions—by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained—and by exciting jealousy, ill will, and a disposition to retaliate in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. Can there be any doubt that the United States displays such a passionate attachment towards Israel? We guarantee Israel a “Qualitative Military Edge” over its neighbors by statute, notwithstanding that Israel is the superpower of the Middle East. We obtusely refuse officially to acknowledge and detail Israel’s nuclear arsenal, although we do so for every other nuclear state: Pakistan, India, North Korea, Russia, China, France, and the United Kingdom. What can be said in Israel’s Knesset is verboten in America’s corridors of power!  Why does the secrecy matter? If we knew and debated the magnitude of Israel’s nuclear arsenal, we would be less hysterically inclined to impute to Iran’s nuclear ambitions an offensive as opposed to a defensive intent. Iran might rationally believe that without a nuclear capability or weapon the United States would invade seeking regime change as in Iraq in 2003, Libya in 2011, and Venezuela in 2026. Nations have long memories. Iran remembers the CIA’s overthrow of the popularly elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953 on behalf of the much reviled Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.  Iran may also recall the 1994 Budapest Memorandum. Ukraine relinquished the world’s third-largest nuclear arsenal to become a non-nuclearized state. In exchange, Russia, the U.S., and the UK pledged to respect Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty, and existing borders. The pledges were not worth a continental. Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, and invaded the remainder of Ukraine in February 2022. Dozens of Members of Congress display Israeli flags in or outside their offices. The United States provides Israel with approximately $3.8 billion in annual military and missile defense aid as part of a 10-year memorandum of understanding running from 2019 to 2028, although Israel’s military arsenal eclipses those of its neighbors by orders of magnitude. The United States squints at the obligation of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee to register as a foreign agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, as underscored in James Bamford’s book Spyfail. We supply weapons to Israel to aid and abet its genocide in Gaza against Palestinians and Israeli wars of aggression against Iran and Lebanon. In a February interview with Tucker Carlson, United States Ambassador Mike Huckabee pontificated that Israel has a “biblical right” to land stretching from the Nile to the Euphrates, arguing that “it would be fine if they took it all.” The precedents lie around like a loaded weapon ready for use by China to justify invading Taiwan, which could provoke the United States to respond with nuclear weapons. Israel predictably places its interests above the interests of the United States. Think of the superspy Jonathan Pollard. Think of the attack on the USS Liberty during the 1967 Six-Day War, which killed 34 Americans and injured hundreds. Think of Benjamin Netanyahu’s 2002 testimony before Congress importuning for a United States invasion of Iraq and overthrow of Saddam Hussein (who was claimed certainly to possess nuclear weapons) to sound the death knell for despotism in the region. Wasn’t Netanyahu thinking what would be best for Israel and not the United States? Our ongoing war against Iran in partnership with Israel was egged on by Israel. Iran has never been an existential or material imminent threat to United States sovereignty. Aren’t we fighting a proxy war for Israel?  Let us end our misplaced love affair with Israel informed by the unstarry-eyed diplomacy of British Foreign Secretary Lord Palmerston: “We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those interests it is our duty to follow.” The post The American ‘Passionate Attachment’ to Israel appeared first on The American Conservative.

Politics Antiwar Dems Should Court Republicans, Not Alienate Them To end the Iran War, America needs a left–right coalition. (Photo by Graeme Sloan/Getty Images) The House of Representatives is scheduled to vote today on a War Powers Resolution to stop the Iran War. The conflict, now in its 74th day, does not appear close to a political settlement, with the U.S. recently targeting Iranian ports and oil tankers with airstrikes and sending warships through Iranian waters as part of “Operation Project Freedom,” President Donald Trump’s short-lived campaign to guide vessels through the Strait of Hormuz. The ceasefire declared on April 8 is, by Trump’s own description this week, on “massive life support,” after the president called Iran’s latest peace proposal “a piece of garbage.” Meanwhile, Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu—whose country, the U.S. State Department says, this war is being fought on behalf of—told CBS this weekend that the war is “not over.” With the Strait of Hormuz under a U.S. naval blockade and tensions rising, congressional action may be necessary to prevent the resumption of large-scale warfare, or at least to further clarify its illegality if a War Powers Resolution passes and Trump vetoes or ignores it. Passing such a bill would require the kind of trans-ideological coalition that a majority of voters in both parties would support, but it’s not clear that enough Democrats are willing to build such a coalition. Polls show that there is a “new center,” as former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) said on Tuesday, forming in the United States, made up of “Americans who no longer want to fund foreign wars, want the hard-earned dollars they work for to comfortably afford a good life, and want corrupt elites like the Epstein class held accountable.”  As the journalist Glenn Greenwald noted Sunday, a non-partisan movement is precisely the kind of coalition that serious advocates build when they actually want to win. Greenwald pointed to the recent success of animal rights activists who last month secured the release of over 1,500 beagles from a Wisconsin research facility by recruiting allies from across the political spectrum. War powers enforcement too has only ever succeeded when efforts to reign in U.S. wars have transcended party lines. The 2019 Yemen resolution, the only one to ever pass both chambers, required Republicans Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) to vote with Democrats. Ahead of today’s tentative War Powers vote, however, Democrats spent the past several weeks seemingly doing everything to make such a coalition impossible, squandering an opportunity to build the sort of populist unity voters desire and raising questions about the seriousness of the Democrats’ supposed opposition to the war. The War Powers Resolution in question comes from Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), one of the most pro-Israel Democrats in the House, who introduced the bill on March 4, 2026 as a softer alternative to a more forceful resolution pushed by Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), which would have required a faster withdrawal but failed to pass. Democratic leaders spent three weeks sitting on Gottheimer’s bill, finally scheduling a vote only after Trump publicly threatened to eradicate Iranian civilization last month. Yet since talks of a new vote emerged, rather than using the House floor and the press to appeal to the Republicans they need to win, Democratic leaders have instead risked alienating them with attacks. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) posted on X that “gas prices are rising” due to what he called the “Republican war of choice,” while House Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking Member Gregory Meeks (D-NY) and Senate Democratic leaders issued floor statements framing the war as a “MAGA Republican” project. Meeks had previously complained to Drop Site News that not enough Republican members would support a War Powers Resolution for him to bring the bill to the floor, despite reports that enough GOP votes for the bill were in fact there. When confronted with that reporting by Drop Site News journalist Lily Franks, Meeks testily told her to “go and talk to some Republicans, and come back and tell me where they are,” apparently abdicating his responsibility to whip votes and washing his hands of the matter. An email put out on Wednesday by the office of the Democratic whip promoting the vote blamed House Republicans for the war, saying they “continue to make excuses for the president and keep Congress on the sidelines.” Rep. Josh Gottheimer did not respond to a request for comment on his bill. The absence of any apparent effort to actually pass Gottheimer’s resolution appears even more cynical in light of the growing number of Republicans available to be persuaded. Rep. Warren Davidson (R-OH) voted yes on an earlier Iran War Powers Resolution and present on a second, while Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) has said she will not support any more funding for the conflict. “I am so tired of spending money elsewhere. I am tired of the industrial war complex getting all of our hard-earned tax dollars. I have folks in Colorado who can’t afford to live,” she told CNN in March.  The potential for trans-ideological unity to pass a War Powers Resolution is so great that the most pro-Israel hawks in Congress have begun to worry. Moments after a failed war powers vote in April, Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL) said that there could be “a different vote count after 60 days,” referring to the 60-day deadline under the War Powers Resolution, after which the president is legally required to withdraw forces from any unauthorized conflict, a deadline which has already expired. There are reasons to question whether the Democratic leadership’s opposition to the Iran War is sincere. After Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) last June rebuked Trump for possibly mulling concessions to Iran and mocked him as “TACO Trump”—using the acronym for “Trump Always Chickens Out”— a coalition of more than two dozen antiwar organizations sent a letter urging him to adjust his rhetoric and give Trump room to pursue diplomacy. In a conversation relayed to both The American Conservative and Drop Site News, a top foreign policy aide to Schumer told an antiwar organizer that, despite broad opposition to the war among Democratic Party voters, a substantial number of Senate Democrats believed Iran ultimately needed to be dealt with militarily— but saw a Middle East war as a political catastrophe, and for that reason preferred Trump to be the one waging it instead. The war, the aide indicated, is seen as a win-win for many Democrats heading into the midterms. The broader refusal of Democratic leaders to pursue the sort of trans-ideological coalition necessary to accomplish their stated policy goals found its clearest expression over the weekend, when Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) appeared at the University of Chicago for an event with David Axelrod. Asked whether she would be open to working with Republicans on shared goals, specifically whether she would partner with Greene against the Iran war and U.S. financing of Israel, AOC said no. Greene, she claimed, is “a proven bigot and an antisemite.” The statements reflect a deeply flawed calculus that places ideological purity over political results, one that dominates liberal discourse but is notably entirely absent among the uniparty, bipartisan establishment coalition that votes as a bloc—regardless of personal differences—to ensure American wars continue. Indeed, AOC has put aside her own political differences with Republicans like Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas to join the hawkish uniparty bloc, for example by voting for sanctions on China. The Republicans who could be persuaded to vote to end this war and form a “new center” exist, and Democrats should try to find them. That they have chosen not to may indicate what that party’s leadership actually wants. The post Antiwar Dems Should Court Republicans, Not Alienate Them appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs Trump Should Be More Ambitious With China Trade deals are not enough to keep the relationship afloat. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images) The Trump administration’s war against Iran is an implicit policy of deprioritizing Asia. Once again, American resources and attention are diverted to the Middle East. An amphibious assault ship and a unit of marines deployed from Japan. Precision weapons the U.S. would need in a fight with China were transferred from the Indo-Pacific and rapidly expended. And President Donald Trump’s April trip to China, to be the first by an American president in nearly a decade, was delayed by a month and a half to May 14 and 15. The president said he needed to stay in Washington because “we’ve got a war going on. I think it’s important that I be here.”  China policy has been a relative success of Trump’s second term record, but it needs sustained attention. And in this administration—especially now—that is the rarest and most-fleeting of commodities. The shakiness of the Iran ceasefire and the lack of progress in negotiations mean that U.S. forces will be mired in combat conditions when the president lands in Beijing. Iran is not a central topic of U.S.–China relations and the war does not make it so. Its biggest impact on this week’s summit will be as a drag on the U.S. side’s already limited willingness to discuss the difficult political-military differences at the root of U.S.–China tensions. Trump defied expectations that he would resume the hardline approach to China begun in his first term and continued by the Biden administration. Since stepping back from his “Liberation Day” tariffs, Trump’s dealmaking instincts have been in the driver’s seat. Last October in Busan, South Korea, he and the Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed a one-year trade “truce” in which China resumed exports of rare earth products to U.S. firms and purchases of U.S. agricultural products, the U.S. suspended an expansion of the list of Chinese firms subject to American export controls, and both sides suspended their most punitive tariffs. The likeliest outcome (and lowest bar for success) of the Beijing visit is a deal to renew and formalize this truce. Preparatory meetings led by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng reportedly discussed agricultural, energy, and aircraft purchases by China, rare earth supplies to the U.S., export controls, AI, and the establishment of permanent “boards” to manage bilateral trade and investment. Rescheduling the summit afforded more time to expand these discussions, which—even before the U.S. attacked Iran—were reportedly hamstrung by lack of preparation on the U.S. side.  The administration should aim higher. It has become fashionable in Washington to analyze U.S.–China relations as a series of techno-economic races. The de facto outsourcing of China policy to Bessent reflects this perspective. Yet the primary causes of the rivalry are political: mutual paranoia about the status and fate of Taiwan; China’s evaluation that the U.S.-led regional order is designed to “comprehensively contain, encircle, and suppress” China; and American concerns that China seeks to overwhelm its military and push the U.S. out of Asia. Neglecting them leaves the relationship vulnerable to crises and a steadily worsening spiral of suspicion and strategic confrontation.  China’s role in coaxing Iran into the April 7 ceasefire was welcome and the American side’s desire for further Chinese help in pressuring Iran into a peace deal gesture at the opportunities that may open if the underlying relationship were to improve. Conversely, reports that China gave satellite surveillance capabilities to Iran and considered sending it portable air-defense systems preview a more confrontational one. U.S. strategy requires engagement on first-order questions. The new National Defense Strategy states that the U.S. seeks a balance of power in the Indo-Pacific and “a decent peace” acceptable to China. These are prudent goals and a vast improvement on the complacent primacy that has defined post-war U.S. policy in Asia. Achieving them depends in part on a mature political track with China, not only to communicate redlines, but also to explore formulas to narrow the underlying disagreements.  Xi has made clear that he wants to discuss these disagreements—especially Taiwan, which he accurately calls “the most important issue” in U.S.–China relations. Taiwan policy was reportedly absent from the Trump–Xi discussions in late October. But days later it flared when Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi told a Diet hearing that a Chinese use of force to blockade Taiwan could constitute “a survival-threatening situation” for Japan, a legal requirement that could allow Japan to intervene militarily with the U.S.  Although the possibility that a Taiwan conflict could meet this threshold has been accepted in Japanese policy circles for a decade, this was the first time a sitting prime minister said it out loud. China accused Takaichi of departing from Japan’s One China Policy and demanded she retract the comments. Takaichi refused and since November the relationship has been in a deep freeze. China has throttled tourism to Japan and imports of Japanese seafood, and put export controls on major Japanese firms. Chinese readouts hint that Xi raised the Japan issue with Trump in phone calls in November and February. And, according to one report, Trump asked Takaichi to pump the brakes. This fits the pattern of previous bouts of Sino-Japanese tension, such as in 2010–2012 over the Senkaku Islands, but—crucially—it is the first since their 1972 diplomatic normalization that is specifically about Taiwan. The Taiwan question has now reached a level of such unmanageability that it is roiling ties between China and Japan, perhaps the United States’ most important ally. China is not poised to use force against Taiwan, and the Iran War probably has little influence on its calculations, which are overwhelmingly related to the specific cross-strait political situation. Nevertheless, Taiwan is not just a difficult side issue. It is becoming a long-term wild card that in the extreme could threaten the stability of the American security system in Asia—partly because the U.S. has tried hard to link its alliances to the defense of Taiwan. Most of Washington’s China-watchers would prefer to marginalize cross-strait politics as an issue in U.S.–China relations. The expectation that Xi will ask Trump to verbally “oppose,” rather than “not support” Taiwan independence and Trump’s February 16 remark that he intends to talk to Xi about American arms sales to Taiwan have raised fears that the U.S. will betray Taiwan’s interests for a short-term trade deal. But the reverse danger should also weigh in U.S. policymakers’ calculations. Merely repeating the traditional talking points does nothing but paper over a widening divergence between each side’s actions and their central commitments under the “One China” framework: that China will strive for peaceful reunification and the U.S. will not pursue a policy of “one China” and “one Taiwan.”  This deteriorating understanding is the foundation of the U.S.–China relationship. Rather than shunting it to the side, the White House should be open to measures for sustaining it. Whether these are rhetorical moves such as “opposing” Taiwan independence or limits on U.S.–Taiwan relations, they should be tied to corresponding Chinese measures favorable to American and Taiwanese interests. These might include qualified renunciations of the use of force against Taiwan or limits on Chinese military activity near the island. This week’s meeting is not make or break. Trump and Xi may meet up to three additional times in 2026. But the ongoing Iran War will constrain the American side’s perception of its freedom of action. No U.S. president—not even Donald Trump—wants to go out on a political limb for a great power deal while also flailing through an unpopular war. White House officials have already told journalists in pre-trip briefings not to expect summit deliverables about Taiwan or arms control. The administration plainly wants to sustain what Secretary of State Marco Rubio called “strategic stability” across the U.S.–China relationship. They may achieve that as a product of leader-level preference and the evident desire of both countries’ systems for an interregnum to patch techno-industrial vulnerabilities.  When Trump asks Xi to help pressure Iran into signing a deal to end the war, however, he may learn that “strategic stability” does not imply cooperation. The war harms China’s interests, yet the adversarial logic of the relationship means Xi is unlikely to help bail the U.S. out of a situation that harms American interests more. More broadly, “strategic stability” will remain vulnerable to crises caused by unplanned military encounters and the declining credibility of the “One China” framework. U.S.–China relations are structurally competitive, but they do not have to be purely so, nor so prone to accident and force. Going beyond a truce requires both sides to deal with difficult political questions, including Taiwan. Hopefully this week’s summit will convince them to take the risk. The post Trump Should Be More Ambitious With China appeared first on The American Conservative.

AOC, Ice Cream, and Veggies