Thomas L. Friedman

also seem to fall into that category.

It's driven really by the worst people in the Trump administration, people like Stephen Miller and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.

And Trump himself, that they weren't trying to solve a problem.

They were trying basically to use a problem, to exploit a problem, to drive a wedge between us, which pretty much applies to all the actors in the Gaza war as well.

And that's where it sort of started in my mind that all these people were actually using violence to

to strengthen their political standing.

Bibi Netanyahu does not want the war in Gaza to end because he knows if it ends with Hamas in any way having political influence in Gaza and Israel out of Gaza, he will be seen by his own constituency as a loser.

Hamas doesn't really want to rearm.

It doesn't want to leave Gaza, even though the war it started visited the worst disaster on Palestinians since 1948 because they want to hold on to power.

So they and Bibi have always been mutual enablers.

And Trump, we know, for a long time has abjured looking for a legislative fix for our immigration problems right now, something that would tighten the border, but also create a pathway for the many millions now of illegal immigrants here, a pathway to legal citizenship.

And so I have a real allergy to people who want to exploit the problems for their political ends, not solve them.

And it seemed to me that there was a real common denominator here.

2026, Steve, is going to be a very important year for both Israel and the United States.

I believe Israel today has the worst government in its history, led by the worst leader in its history.

This is a government that, in the middle of the war, continued pursuing a judicial coup, basically, to break the oversight of the Supreme Court over Israel's political executive branch, basically in order to pursue an annexationist agenda in the West Bank.

I believe that if this government is reelected and can complete that agenda, it will be the end of Israel as you have known it.

And in America, if Republicans hold the House and Senate in 2026 and continue to basically have all the levers of power, the White House, the Supreme Court, the Senate, and the House, and Donald Trump does not have to worry about reelections.

I just can't imagine what he might attempt to do.

And he would be totally unfettered.