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How Israeli senior officials deal with an unpredictable Trump

The decisions by President Donald Trump to pull out of the Iranian nuke agreement, and recently to exit Syria, worry Israeli senior officials.
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President Donald Trump will mark two years in the White House this month, a milestone that sounded unbelievable at the time but has been a dream come true for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu spent 11 years in office with Democratic US presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who — to put it mildly — did not appreciate or believe him and waged a constant war of attrition against him over the settlements he approved in the West Bank. Finally, there is a Republican on the scene — and what a Republican! Netanyahu and the entire Israeli political right welcomed Trump ecstatically. But did their expectations pan out?

Initial indications were promising, with growing pro-Israel declarations at the United Nations and a presidential visit to Israel in May 2017 that was greeted with sweeping enthusiasm. Things peaked with Trump’s decision to pull the United States out of the nuclear agreement with Iran and move the US Embassy to Jerusalem. If we add to all of the above the pro-Israel advocacy by former US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, who is more popular with Israelis than most of the local politicians, we get a dream come true, a state of affairs that transcends all expectations and a golden age in general.

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