Leaders ‘not doing their job’ in Middle East conflict

Dearborn — Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump campaigned Friday in Dearborn, the nation’s largest Arab city, arguing that peace in the Middle East can and should be achieved.

Four days before Tuesday’s election, Trump greeted a throng of supporters inside The Great Commoner, a coffee shop in downtown Dearborn. The former president was presented with a plaque in the shape of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula and autographed other plaques featuring a peace quote from former Republican President Ronald Reagan.

Trump answered several questions from reporters but did not outline his specific plans for how he would resolve the ongoing war in Gaza between Israel and the militant group Hamas. There are people in the US and the Middle East “who are not doing their jobs,” Trump said.

“When they end, when they succeed, you will have peace,” Trump said.

“You will have peace in the Middle East,” Trump said at another point. “And they should have in the Middle East, but not with the clowns you have in the Middle East.”

It was unclear who Trump was referring to as “clowns.”

For months, Trump has been trying to win over Arab-American voters, many of whom live in traditionally Democratic areas of Michigan, but have argued that Democratic President Joe Biden has not done enough to end the war in the Middle East.

In Michigan’s February Democratic primary, 101,623 votes were cast for “unemployed,” in protest of Biden’s support for Israel in the ongoing conflict. Biden ended his bid for re-election on July 21which led to the Democratic nomination of Vice President Kamala Harris for president.

Among the 50 states, Michigan has the second-largest population of Arab Americans, with about 392,000, according to the nonprofit Arab American Institute.

On October 18, Trump visited Hamtramck and campaigned with the city’s mayor, Amer Ghalib, who is Muslim. During that trip, Trump told reporters that Biden was trying to hold back Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel.

“They should probably do the opposite,” said Trump, who did not elaborate on that remark.

In a social media post Friday, U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Detroit, the only Palestinian American member of Congress, labeled Trump “a proud Islamophobe” and “a serial liar who can’t stand peace.”

But Tlaib, a fierce critic of Israel, did not endorse Harris this fall.

“The reality is that Administrator Biden’s unconditional support for genocide is what got us here,” Tlaib added. “This should be a wake-up call to those who continue to support genocide. This election was not supposed to be close.”

However, Sami Khaldi, president of the Dearborn Democratic Club, said Trump is trying to reform. He is not the candidate of peace but the candidate of division, argued Khaldi.

“Vice President Harris has been very clear: He believes it is time to end the war in Gaza, bring the hostages home and end the suffering once and for all — while making sure Israel is safe and making sure the Palestinians get their can realize the right to dignity. freedom and self-determination,” Khaldi added.

Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, made a number of Muslim-related comments during the an interview with podcast host Joe Rogan on Wednesday. Rogan referred to a group of Muslim activists who seek to “outrun all non-Muslims.”

“It scares the hell out of me,” Vance replied, during the three-hour interview.

“Where you see real real religious tyranny is more and more in Western societies, where you’ve had a large influx of immigrants who don’t necessarily assimilate into Western values, but try to create, I think, religious tyranny locally,” Vance added. .

Trump’s visit to Michigan on Friday came four days before Tuesday’s presidential election. This fall, he was locked in a tight race in Michigan with Harris, a former U.S. senator from California. She will a series of stops in Michigan Sunday.

Vance campaigned in Kalamazoo County on Friday, while Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, held rallies in Detroit, Flint and Traverse City.

A late October poll of 600 likely Michigan voterscommissioned by The Detroit News and WDIV-TV (Channel 4), found Harris beating Trump by 3 percentage points, 46.7%-43.7%, with 7.3% of respondents saying they plan to vote for a third party candidate. Another 2.1% said they were undecided.

The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Four years ago, Democrat Joe Biden defeated Trump in Michigan by 154,188 votes, or 3 percentage points, 51%-48%.

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