Watching King Abdullah and Marco Rubio squirm in their seats while Trump continues on about his Gaza plan is quite something.
— Lani Refiti (@LaniRefiti) February 11, 2025
“We’ll take Gaza, we’ll own it and cherish it” - boy oh boy pic.twitter.com/SLKBWnap5B
Wish there'd been more Rubio (or just more cowbell) in the video of that meeting a week ago, which Trump decided
contrary to custom not to hold in private before the photo op and public
statements but did all three at once, presumably to prevent King Abdullah from
screaming at him; but Rubio's face in this photo reminds me of that lady in
the Hermès scarfs who used to watch Trump explaining virology to the nation
from the standpoint of his transcendent ignorance—deeply panicked but trying
not to show it. I didn't realize until that moment that Trump actually has no idea
what the Gaza ceasefire deal (which he has endorsed) entails: the sequence of
phase 1, releasing some hostages and prisoners to set the stage for phase 2,
negotiating a final disposition of the territory and releasing all the
remaining hostages, followed by phase 3, implementing the deal and permanent
ceasefire (the Biden deal I've been telling you about for a year), as revealed
by Trump's comment,
“As far as I’m concerned, if all of the hostages aren’t returned by Saturday at 12 o’clock, I think it’s an appropriate time. I would say, cancel it and all bets are off and let hell break out. I’d say they ought to be returned by 12 o’clock on Saturday,” Trump said.
No, it's not an appropriate time. Phase 2 hasn't even started yet. It would be nice for the hostages and their families, who I support, and no doubt also nice for Netanyahu, who I don't support, but it has no relation to the agreement painfully worked out over the past year. It's demanding that all the parties trash that agreement and start all over again, which clearly meant it couldn't be wrapped up on Saturday. It's just a completely new idea nobody else has ever heard of, because Trump just made it up on the spot and doesn't know enough about the situation to realize that it can't possibly happen, and there's a reason it can't possibly happen.
It's nothing but a big smelly turd deposited in the Oval Office that is of no relevance to anything, except to Trump's equally irrelevant fantasy of taking control of the Gaza Strip as his own, or Jared Kushner's, development project, with all the irritating Gazans cleared out of the way in Egypt or Jordan (I don't know who he thinks are going to be the housekeepers and waitstaff and caddies, perhaps they'll be imported from the Philippines), in spite of endless attempts by Jordanians and Egyptians and Saudis to explain to His Imperial Stupidity that it can't be done. A turd the existence of which nobody present dares to acknowledge, because Big Donald might get upset (Abdullah did have something to say about it once he got out of there, though he did lower himself to suggesting that the meeting might be described as "constructive"—he's far from the worst king in his neighborhood, not that I support kings, but diplomacy requires some dishonesty).
Things may have marched in a different direction since I started drafting these remarks with the development of a Trump policy on Ukraine, but I think Trump's stupidity remains the main factor. I'm sure I'll get back to that later.
