Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Kr. said in an interview published Tuesday that Israel is a “moral nation,” and he backed its response to Hamas terrorists, opposing President Joe Biden’s anti-Israel drift.
In the interview, conducted by Reuters and published in the Jerusalem Post, Kennedy expressed concern for the humanitarian cost of the war to Palestinian civilians, but said that Israel had no choice but to respond as it had.
From the interview:
“Any other nation that was adjacent to a neighboring nation that was bombing it with rockets, sending commandos over to murder its citizens, pledging itself to murder every person in that nation and annihilate it, would go and level it with aerial bombardment,” Kennedy said.
“But Israel is a moral nation. So it didn’t do that. Instead, it built an iron dome to protect itself so it would not have to go into Gaza.”
He said Hamas gave Israeli leaders no choice after fighters stormed into Israel on October 7, killing 1,200 people and capturing 253 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Rather than pressuring Israel, Kennedy said, the U.S. should be pressuring states that currently support Hamas.
Several Jewish leaders expressed their support for Kennedy’s position, notably Democrat-turned-Republican Dov Hikind, a former New York State Assemblyman who is the founder and leader of Americans Against Antisemitism:
Just got off the phone with @RobertKennedyJr to thank him for being a real friend to the Jewish people and State of Israel.
For the record: @potus & @SenSchumer this is what true friendship looks like.
Wish the Dems would take a lesson from him but doubtful they will put… pic.twitter.com/YV09YgdGbz— Dov Hikind (@HikindDov) March 20, 2024
Kennedy, whose environmental career has placed him on the political left, has lost donors and staff members over his support for Israel. He says he is equally interested in finding a peaceful resolution to the Middle East conflict.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent book, “The Zionist Conspiracy (and how to join it),” now available on Audible. He is also the author of the e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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