|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
[Craving even more FPM content? Sign up for FPM+ to unlock exclusive series, virtual town-halls with our authors, and more. Click here to sign up.]
Steve Witkoff, the real estate tycoon turned international negotiator, has become the subject of controversy with some conservatives attacking him and others rushing out to defend him.
“In a world left in chaos thanks to Joe Biden, Steve Witkoff is the diplomat America needs right now,” Sen. Jim Banks claimed.
Tucker Carlson hailed Witkoff as “the most effective American diplomat in a generation.”
But Witkoff, whatever his flaws, is far more honest than his PR men on X or Capitol Hill, and has never denied that he was just implementing the policies of the Biden administration.
In Jan, at Mar-a-Lago, Witkoff stated that “the Biden administration is the tip of the spear” in the Hamas negotiations. Biden has “got a solid team, and I appreciated that they’re allowing us to be collaborative.”
“I think Steve Witkoff has been a terrific partner in this,” Secretary of State Blinken praised him on MSNBC.
Much later, Witkoff told Tucker, “When I first got in and I was talking to Brett McGurk, who was the envoy on behalf of Biden, he was a smart guy.”
“He said to me, ‘This is where I want to get to, Steve.’ And so when I went in there, I went in with the imprimatur of the president.”
“Steve became a close partner of mine, I think it’s safe to say a friend,” McGurk told PBS.
Whose deal was it really?
Witkoff admitted to FOX News that he “had nothing to do with the mathematics behind the prisoner release and the hostage release”. The deal’s terms were set “months ago in the so-called May 27 protocol that was agreed to by Hamas, by the Israelis, and monitored by the United States under the Biden administration” and “our job was to speed up the process.”
And where did the May 27 protocol come from?
On a May 31 call, an unnamed senior Biden administration official told reporters that the proposed deal was “nearly identical to Hamas’s own proposals of only a few weeks ago”.
Witkoff’s achievement was taking a Biden administration proposal “nearly identical” to the Hamas demands and lending some muscle to the Biden team to push it through. That is why Biden officials like Blinken and McGurk praised Witkoff for enlisting Trump to bail them out.
There’s plenty of reasons to be critical of Witkoff, but he has been honest about what he was doing, giving credit to the Biden team, and admitting that he was advancing their agenda.
The same cannot be said of his defenders.
In his op-ed, Sen. Jim Banks claimed that Witkoff had stepped “into a leadership vacuum” and that “globalist critics continue to chirp from the sidelines, frustrated largely because Witkoff is shaking things up” and that problems “can’t be solved with old-school globalist solutions.”
Witkoff proposed a 10-15 year UN rebuilding program and allowing Hamas to stay on in Gaza. Rather than ending the war, the Biden ceasefire he worked for unwound into another war. As a result of the deal, the Trump administration sent another $134 million in aid to Gaza.
This isn’t “shaking things up” and Witkoff’s solutions are the same “old-school globalist solutions”. When a man is being praised by Blinken and the entire Biden old guard, the last thing he can be accused of doing is shaking things up. And Witkoff doesn’t claim that he is.
What new solutions has Witkoff come up with? The Obama ones. Negotiate with terrorists. Pretend they’re reasonable. Give them what they want. Act confused when it doesn’t work out.
According to Banks, “Witkoff’s key to successful negotiation is straightforward, admitting that deals only work when they benefit all parties.” According to Tucker, this is “so different from the posture that the last couple of generations of diplomats have taken, which is like, here’s what we want. Shut up and do it.” When did Obama or Clinton ever talk like that to America’s enemies?
Figuring out what the terrorists want and trying to give it to them were the signature diplomatic policies of the Carter, Clinton and Biden administrations. Those are the “old-school globalist solutions” which is why President Trump is such a breath of fresh air and Witkoff isn’t.
Witkoff’s initial Iran proposals pick up where Obama’s Iran Deal left off.
After reports emerged that the administration would let Iran keep a ‘civilian’ nuclear program, Witkoff appeared to suggest that the goal was Obama’s old capping enrichment gimmick.
“Iran “does not need to enrich past 3.67%. In some circumstances, they’re at 60%, in other circumstances 20%. That cannot be,” Witkoff argued. “You do not need to run — as they claim — a civil nuclear program where you’re enriching past 3.67%.”
Capping Iran’s nuclear enrichment at 3.67% had been the objective of Obama’s Iran Deal.
Obama had falsely claimed that his deal would force Iran to “keep its level of uranium enrichment at 3.67% — significantly below the enrichment level needed to create a bomb.”
The 3.67% was an Obama bait-and-switch.
“This would be a serious mistake because reactor grade uranium (3-5% enriched) can be quickly enriched to weapons grade,” Fred Fleitz, vice chair of the America First Policy Institute, warned, showing that 3.5% could go to 90% in only months. “Given Iran’s secret nuclear weapons research, Iran cannot be trusted to do ANY uranium enrichment.”
Witkoff has since reversed course and stated that Iran must stop and eliminate enrichment.
But the 3.67% number was revealing of where Witkoff gets his ideas. The enrichment cap and the talk of verification on enrichment were xeroxed right from Obama, Biden and the EU.
In 2023, Brett McGurk, Witkoff’s pal, had been dispatched by the Biden administration to offer Iran sanctions relief in exchange for freezing some of its nuclear enrichment.
It may not be a new idea, but Witkoff’s defenders are the only ones who accuse him of having new ideas. The Obama and Biden pros recognize that Witkoff is following in their footsteps.
Whatever Witkoff’s agendas are, he’s in over his head, and he outsourced his negotiations to everyone from the Biden team to the Islamic terror state of Qatar with whom he’s done business and whose terrorist leaders he has repeatedly praised. Knowing nothing about the Middle East hasn’t given him a fresh perspective: it just made him an easy dupe for everyone who does.
“I thought we had a deal — an acceptable deal. I even thought we had an approval from Hamas,” Witkoff had told FOX News. “Maybe that’s just me getting duped.”
It’s an honest admission. Witkoff’s defenders who pretend that he’s a genius shaking up diplomacy by appeasing Islamic terrorist states could at least try to be as honest as him.
Skeve Whakoff is clear proof that President Trump still hasn’t learned his lesson about snakes in his administration.
You nailed my exact feelings and did it without any ‘ F ” BOMBS!
In this case, F bombs are called for along with all kinds of bombs to wipe out Hamas and all its supporters from Gaza
But, but……Whakoff wants to talk and do a deal. What could go wrong? 🙁
That’s the thing. As Sir Richard Burton pointed out in his 5000+ pages of his travels in Arab countries and such in the 1800s, Arab/Muslim culture evolved in a different direction than ours. Fantastic tales, like 1001 Arabian Nights, and fantastic lies, and verbal swindles, and cheating on trade deals, where the biggest swindler is the most honored figure in their culture, are their ideals, rather than the science and technological progress, favored by our culture.
Then we project our values on them, and get swindled every time. Even Burton figured he had to allow for paying double what the item was worth if he wanted to make a deal with them.
LOL! I encountered something similar in Indonesia.
They had different prices for stuff for different nationalities. Indos were offered the best deals, us Bules (whiteys) were second on the list, and Japanese were last because the Indos knew those people would pay for anything. I remember renting some water craft or whatever they’re called in Bali and dealing with that. (Those things are super fun, by the way. The most fun you can have with your pants on.) I liked that about the Indos, though. You could bargain prices with them. You can’t do that here, almost never, anyway.
They even had it on their signs. When I was at Borobudur, it had a sign showing the prices for admission. Indos paid less, us foreigners paid more. At least they’re honest about it.
I’ve read, and heard, Witkoff’s name hundreds of times over recent years; but until this article, never knew much about his background, affiliations, loyalties, connections, and previous efforts with Obama/Kerry and Biden to guarantee the mad ayatollahs their ambition of completing their program to develop and deploy nuclear-armed missiles to destroy first Israel, then us, and then the rest of the world’s “infidels.”
In this literal life-or-death struggle between Evil and Civilization, “Oops, I made a mistake” is not acceptable.
The threat and the imminent danger to our literal survival are clear, and must be dealt with, and eliminated, NOW.
No flimsy paper “agreement” like the one pathetically waved by Neville Chamberlain upon his return from Munich, is, or could possibly be, acceptable.
The famous wisdom of “Those who forget the lessons of history will be doomed to repeat it” has never been more imminently important than now.
The latter …………..
I’ve been reading a lot about rich Oligarchs in Ancient Greece and Rome. While they may be genius at accumulating wealth, that genius doesn’t translate to political wisdom.
Yes, a lot of them had to drink hemlock or otherwise take it up the ass. Smart people can be very dumb sometimes.
Yes, very dumb. It was a revelation to me. I had always assumed those rich Oligarchs were smart. But in case after case after case they ruined themselves and their countries when they got involved in politics.
Boy, would I hate to be a politician.
And hundreds of anti-MAGA dumbasses rallied and marched today in downtown San Jose. And the stupid A-holes started in St James Park only a block from my apartment building! The 22 minutes I waited on the platform for the light rail seemed like hours. They had the dumb signs like you see on TV. Homemade to seem authentic but pure bullshit. They don’t fool me. There were hundreds of those trads and when I came back from the supermarket they were marching in long lines from the park to the main street downtown. There was about five times as many of them at that point.
I didn’t hurt anybody but it was hard not to. Everything they were agitating for were things 80% of Americans hate: MS-13 gang members returned “home,” Trump and Musk are KGB(?) and fascists, and blah, blah, blah, just like on the TV news. And most of them were past retirement age and I’d say 99% of them were UGLY!!!!!!
I hope they aren’t around on Easter. Alzheimer Joe’s handlers turned the last one into tranny day at the White House, and I think America has had it with trannies and opposition to peace and prosperity.
And the skeezy homeless guys were out in force along with young punks, creeping up behind me and walking onto and of the platform. I don’t let guys walk up behind me. I turn and face them. What a shitty Holy Saturday. Lefties take perverse satisfaction at ruining things for normal people.
Yeah, they are doing the same thing up here. The left/Democrats figure this is their big chance.
Yes, their big chance to fail.
They’re such stupid scumbags. No normal person cares about their demonstrations. “We hate peace and prosperity and TRUMP! Derp, derp derp!” Stinky hippy retards. America doesn’t care about you or your opposition to society!
Sorry you had problems up in Wine Country. I always think of that as a nice place but lefties are just like rats. They infest everything and everywhere. I think of that place as an area to just lie outside in the sun and sip some wine.
Both Witkoff and the US should end all ties with Qatar, including our big base. And President Trump should put no more cronies where they can do harm.
Qatar is a terror sponsoring state, wth are these people thinking getting cosy with people who want them dead? I call him schitekopf because he is.
What these terrorists want is death and destruction – that is all – they are not interested in building anything – how many times are we going to play the fools for these murderous savages? There is no appeasing them – there is no peace with them – they build nothing, they don’t care one twit about human life, their own, their family, their neighbors – that is inbred in them, that is reinforced in childhoods of these demonic mudda fukkaz – they must be wiped out to the last DNA!
Their inbreeding has destroyed their DNA beyond redemption.
Good article.
We need someone better, smarter, and stronger than Witkoff.
I was hoping that this article would delve into the likely reasons why President Trump hasn’t fired Witkoff, and why he suddenly decided to pursue negotiations with the lying, dishonest Mullahs. He used to understand that it was foolish to negotiate with the Mullahs. Why has he suddenly, recklessly, pivoted on Iran??
The risks couldn’t be higher, and the window of opportunity couldn’t be narrower, than is the case with Iran’s nuclear pursuits, yet President Trump has put a complete buffoon in charge of the matter. Why can’t he see this?
President Trump is usually refreshingly right, blunt, tough, and on target. His initial approach to Iran reflected those traits. For some reason, he suddenly shifted from a position of strength to one of feeble weakness, driven by Witkoff. He really should know better. His instincts ought to be screaming at him to dump Witkoff and get the job done with Israel. The sane world would be grateful to him, including the majority of Iranians.
President Trump has made several poor choices in hiring (Cohen, Coney Barrett, Kavanaugh, Wray, Omarosa, and now, Witkoff). I just wish he didn’t do this when a nuclear armed Iran is at stake.
I have wondered if the cause for Trump’s shift is that he is profoundly attached to the possibility of receiving a Nobel peace prize. I hope not. A prize won’t matter for long if the Mullahs develop nuclear weapons and they commence with destroying the world.