By Abe Greenwald
Thursday, June 18, 2026
JD Vance's Jew-baiting is no longer hiding in plain
sight. It’s no longer something that has to be inferred from his choice of
anti-Semitic allies, his serial flirtations with the rhetoric of the podcast
right, or his clear displeasure whenever the Jewish state asserts itself in a
way that conflicts with his political faction's priorities. It’s now out in the
open.
“If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government,” he
said today, “I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have
anywhere left in the entire world.” Vance then added that Donald Trump is “the
only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of
Israel at this moment in time.”
We get it. Everyone hates Israel, and maybe they’re all
onto something. Vance has been itching to say this for a long time, and Donald
Trump’s failure in Iran finally gave him the opportunity. The president is
letting JD be JD. Turns out, he’s exactly who I thought he was.
Vance’s premise, it’s worth noting, is false. Israel has
relations with dozens of countries and maintains significant strategic
partnerships throughout the world, even with countries that criticize it
obsessively. And while Vance claims that Israeli cabinet members are personally
attacking Trump, they’ve merely commented on the Iran deal and what it means
for Israel.
But the real problem here is moral. Vance's formulation
is intended to put Israel in a position that Jews know all too well: that of a
people whose fate depends on staying in the good graces of a powerful ruler.
And Jews in this circumstance, Vance was saying, should really know when
they’re pushing their luck.
The vice president wasn’t describing an alliance. He was
describing dependence—a dependence that strips a nation of the right to
disagree. The logic runs as follows: Because Israel needs American support,
Israel must refrain from criticizing the American president. Because Trump is
sympathetic to Israel, Israel should suppress its own judgments whenever those
judgments conflict with his. It doesn’t matter that Israel hasn’t let a day of
Trump’s presidency pass without expressing its gratitude for his support. What
Vance is talking about is obedience.
That’s not how alliances work. The United States has
never expected Britain, France, Japan, or any other ally to surrender its voice
in exchange for American protection. In a healthy alliance, partners are free
to speak candidly when interests diverge. The alliance works because it’s
rooted in shared aims and shared values, not because one side has purchased the
silence of the other. But Trump doesn’t speak the language of shared values
and, anyway, it’s time Israel was reminded that it’s subject to different
rules. So Vance was instructing the Jewish state to remember who its protector
is.
Of course, Zionism emerged, in part, as a rejection of
the idea that Jews should live at the mercy of leaders whose favor could be
granted one day and withdrawn the next. That’s why anti-Semites can’t tolerate
it.
And the anti-Semites loved Vance’s reprimand. The
anti-Jewish left cheered along with the groyper-adjacent right. “Finally!” Cenk
Uygur wrote on X. “This is the kind of energy we need from our leaders. I hate
to give @JDVance credit, but he’s obviously correct here. It’s infuriating to
see them assume they can boss us around when we’re their only remaining ally
and they owe us everything.”
Actually, Israel is the only country “at this moment in
time” that’s been unwavering in its support for the president and the only
country that’s proved itself fighting alongside the United States in ages. You
could say it’s the only powerful true ally that this administration has. And it
will not be bound by the terms of Trump’s Iran deal or chastened by the
scolding of JD Vance.
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