On tarmac with Trump, Israeli politicians talk up terror, Jerusalem and themselves

On Sunday afternoon, a day before the arrival in Israel of US President Donald Trump, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu angrily cut short a meeting with his coalition leaders after finding out that some of his ministers planned to skip the welcome ceremony.

Several ministers had decided not to attend after learning that they would not be included in the receiving line on the airport tarmac and would therefore not be shaking Trump’s hand, he was told. Furious, the prime minister ordered that all cabinet ministers attend the ceremony, without exceptions.

On Monday, as Trump disembarked from Air Force One at Ben Gurion Airport, all but three ministers were waiting to greet him, and, in a change from the original plan, all were given the chance for the coveted hand-shake with the US president. Finance Minister and Kulanu chairman Moshe Kahlon, Interior Minister and Shas chairman Arieh Deri and Housing Minister Uri Ariel (Jewish Home) were the only cabinet members to skip the event, with a spokesman for Kahlon saying he “wasn’t aware he was required to be there.”

But for some of the ministers who did attend, the excitement of meeting the leader of the free world may have gone to their heads.

As Netanyahu took Trump along the line of ministers and dignitaries, introducing each one in turn, Education Minister and chair of the hawkish Jewish Home party Naftali Bennett took his handshake as an opportunity to give the president a message.

“It’s 50 years since we unified Jerusalem,” Bennett told Trump while grasping Trump’s hand. “Now is the time to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel,” he said.

“That’s an idea,” Trump replied, before moving onto the next minister in the line.

Bennett’s comments, which were also echoed to Trump when he met Environment Minister Ze’ev Elkin (Likud), came after a rift appeared to form between the US and Israel as the Trump administration refused to recognize Israeli sovereignty over East Jerusalem, including the Western Wall, considered the holiest site where Jews may pray.

Trump had called Jerusalem Israel’s “eternal capital” and vowed to move the US embassy there while campaigning for president, but has since appeared to retreat from those stances. “President Trump has not yet made a decision on moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem and doesn’t plan on making a decision on this issue until after his visit,” a US official told The Times of Israel last week.

In another of the introductions, Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan appeared to mistakenly tell Trump that a traffic accident in Tel Aviv earlier Monday had in fact been a terror attack.

After joking with Trump and Netanyahu over who was really in charge of security in Israel, Erdan said, “Actually, there may have been a terror attack today. They are still investigating. In Tel Aviv, a ramming.”

Despite Erdan’s assertion, police had ruled out terrorism an hour earlier, determining the incident, in which a man driving without a license hit a bicyclist, a man on a motor scooter and a pedestrian, to be a car accident. Erdan had not been updated, because he did not have his cellphone with him, it was later reported.

Netanyahu also slightly misinformed Trump, introducing Likud Minister Ayoub Kara as “the first Druze minister in Israel’s history.”

While Kara is the only currently serving Druze minister, he was preceded by Salah Tarif, another member of the Druze community, who became the first non-Jew to serve as a minister when he was appointed by Ariel Sharon in 2001.

Kara, whose often-unfiltered comments that have in the past gotten him in trouble, told Trump in broken English: “You’re trip to Saudi Arabia was important. I like this cooperation. I like you. It is important you are supporting the prime minister.”

But the biggest faux pas of the ceremony came when MK Oren Hazan pushed his way through the line of dignitaries to snatch a selfie with Trump.

Hazan, a troublemaker freshman lawmaker from Netanyahu’s Likud party, was not supposed to be standing in the line of people shaking Trump’s hand, but somehow managed to make his way there.

He later posted the picture on his Facebook page with the caption, “Thank you Mr. President — it was my pleasure!”

After greeting Trump, Hazan fiddled with his phone as the US president waited patiently. Netanyahu reached out and tried to move Hazan’s arm, but to no avail.

According to Hazan, while taking the photo he told the president that he was considered “the Israeli Trump.”