Vance Takes on the Israel Lobby

I have been a keen observer of the Israeli-Arab conflict for almost six decades.  I’ve witnessed and documented every possible up and down (mostly down), every bit of hope and despair, every possible vicissitude in relations between the US and Israel.  But events of the past few days, featuring both Trump and Vance excoriating Israel for sabotaging the Memorandum of Understanding, have been truly astonishing.

Earlier this week, Trump directed this expletive-laden rant at Netanyahu after he attempted to sabotage the Iran ceasefire agreement:

“You’re fucking crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this.”

…Trump was “pissed” and at one point yelled at Netanyahu: “What the fuck are you doing?”

He followed this up at the G7 conference:

“He [Netanyahu] will say: ‘we are the big partner, and he is the very small partner. And that’s true…Bibi…gets a little bit excited sometimes. We have a little dispute over Lebanon.  I say, you can do a little softer touch, Bibi, you don’t have to knock down a building every time somebody walks into it that’s from Hezbollah…I think they could do better, with respect to Hezbollah…I’m saying when two drones are shot into the desert and dropped harmlessly, you don’t have to knock down buildings in Beirut.”

Not to be outdone, Vice-President Vance reinforced his boss’ message in no uncertain terms:

If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have aywhere left in the entire world…

Over the last three months two-thirds of the defensive (sic) weapons that have protected your homeland have been built by American hands and paid for by American tax dollars. [Israeli ministers critical of the deal] need to wake up and smell the reality of the situation that country is in.”

“If everything is Jew-hatred, then nothing is Jew-hatred.” — the Vice President of the U.S. pic.twitter.com/uoVaTQfumN

— Jacob N. Kornbluh (@jacobkornbluh) June 19, 2026

Highlighting the Israeli reliance on US weapons touches a sore spot in the relationship. Despite its arms industry producing some of the most advanced weapons systems, Israel is dependent on the US to provide its most critical munitions.  Without them, it would be severely limited in its military operations, which now include Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Iraq and Gaza.

This is regional dominance at the barrel of a gun and key to its national security policy.  The country literally has no diplomatic strategy. No alternative to force. Without the latter, it would be confused, demoralized, at sea. It would be a rude awakening.  One which it is currently incapable of accepting.  Vance is alluding to this dependence and subtly warning Israel it could all go away. This is again an astonishingly candid statement.

Vance criticizes conflation of criticism with anti-Semitism

Today Vance went one step further. He attacked, implicitly, the Israel Lobby, and particularly its misuse of anti-Semitism. It was a shot across the bow of Aipac and its allies, who undoubtedly are ginning up opposition to the Iran ceasefire.  Vance shocking statement has rarely, if ever, been heard from a US leader. His statement that America’s interests are different than those of Israel is anathema to the Lobby, which is built on the premise that they are indivisible.

Here Vance explodes the claim:

I do think…advocates of Israel make…or pro-Israel people in the United States make two critical mistakes: one…is not delineating between America’s interests and Israeli interests, because they’re not always the same. But the second is always conflating criticism of a particular [Israeli] government with Jew-hatred. Because if everything is Jew-hatred, then nothing is Jew-hatred.

…We have to be very careful about not calling every…We have to be very careful in order to serve a certain [pro-Israel] foreign policy objective, not to try to criticize somebody as anti-Semitic when they’re just not…

The last few days I’ve been defending the president’s decision to end the Iran deal [sic] and I find that often the arguments are well, Israel doesn’t think this is good, therefore it’s bad. And my reaction is: Israel’s opinions matter but fundamentally they are separate [from ours]…

I think it’s upon us as leaders and public commentators to try to be very rational about this…to distinguish what is legitimate disagreement from ethnic hatred…

Here Vance distinguishes criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism not only in general terms, but specifically in reference to the Administration.  He is widening the permitted discourse about the bilateral relationship in a way that is not only healthy, but critical.

Earlier, Vance had criticized Israel’s deliberate sabotage of the ceasefire agreement via bloody attacks in Lebanon. Again, his accusation displays unprecedented candor:

Trump gets “frustrated”…when they seem to be “on the cusp of a major breakthrough in the agreement, and then all of a sudden, there is a major explosion that goes off in …Beirut, and a lot of people who have nothing to do with Hezbollah lose their lives,” Vance said. “That’s not acceptable. That’s the sort of thing…we [must] ensure it doesn’t happen.

…The Israelis — just like everybody else — have to respect this peace process that is fundamentally good for them and good for the entire region.”

Though I find almost everything about Trump and Vance to be repulsive–on this subject they’ve said out loud what everyone’s been thinking, but was too afraid to say.  They’ve detected a sea-change in the American electorate toward Israel.  This re-calibration has made it open season on both Israel and the Lobby.  Among Democrats this process has developed since 10/7 and the Gaza genocide. But now even Republicans are seeing the handwriting on the wall.  Trump and Vance have shown it to them clearly.  Future administrations can now say things they could never say before; thus normalizing relations. No longer will Israel enjoy a Special Relationship.  No preferential treatment.  No more $30-billion ten-year sweetheart arms deals.

We are entering a Brave New World in US-Israel relations.  The genie is out of the bottle and it will be very hard for the Israel Lobby to get him back in.  It will, oh how it will try.  Its billionaire oligarchs spent $100-million in the last election cycle to get their pro-Israel presidents, senator and representatives elected; and to defeat the rising tide of left-wing Israel-critical candidates.  Money may be the mother’s milk of politics, but there comes a time when money no longer matters.  You can throw bushels of it at your favorite pro-Israel candidate. But you can no longer turn a genocide into a case of self-defense.  You can fool some of the people some of the time. But ultimately, you can’t fool enough people to get such candidates elected.  Once people see reality for what it is, no amount of manipulation can make them not see what they do see.  We are not there yet, but we’re moving swiftly in that direction.