WASHINGTON — Standing in the midst of a vast arena downtown, Donald Trump stared into the two small screens before him and read the words he had come to deliver to a skeptical audience at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s annual meeting.
“I didn’t come here tonight to pander to you about Israel,” Trump said carefully, as the words rolled across the screen. “That’s what politicians do — all talk, no action.”
But while Trump’s past statements have caused concern among Israel advocates, including his promise to be “neutral” in negotiations between Israel and Palestinians, he offered promises Monday very much in line with what the audience had hoped to hear. At times, he brought the crowd to its feet.
He lambasted the Iran nuclear deal negotiated by President Barack Obama, who he noted was “in his final year, yay.” He pledged to relocate the American Embassy to the “eternal capital of the Jewish people, Jerusalem.” And he seemed to paper over his past statements about neutrality, promising that in any negotiation, “we will send a clear signal that there is no daylight between America and our most reliable ally, the state of Israel.”
It was an unusual scene for Trump, who has largely eschewed scripts and tends to speak in front of adoring crowds at raucous rallies.
Appearing more subdued than usual, he stuck closely to his message and, on several occasions, his own words appeared to contradict his past statements, including some he had made just hours earlier.
Trump’s AIPAC appearance served as a test of sorts as he tries to morph his anti-establishment campaign into one that can gain support from at least some of Washington’s traditional Republican leadership.
He held a private meeting with GOP lawmakers before his AIPAC speech as part of a process in which a candidate who has largely rejected the party’s orthodoxy might achieve party unity.
Earlier in the day, Trump was attacked by Democratic presidential front-runner and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for suggesting in past interviews that he would remain neutral in negotiating the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
“We need steady hands,” Clinton told AIPAC, referencing the business mogul without naming him. “Not a president who says he’s neutral on Monday, pro-Israel on Tuesday and who-knows-what on Wednesday because everything is negotiable.
“Well, my friends, Israel’s security is nonnegotiable!” Clinton said.
Clinton, who has at times been at the center of foreign policy decisions opposed by Israel, set a hawkish tone but saved her most forceful rhetoric for Trump.
“You’ll get a glimpse of a potential U.S. foreign policy that would insult our allies, not engage them, and embolden our adversaries, not defeat them,” Clinton said. “For the security of Israel and the world, we need America to remain a respected global leader, committed to defending and advancing the international order.”
In the days before Trump’s appearance at AIPAC, a group of rabbis called for a boycott of Trump’s speech, and the prominent Jewish civil rights organization, the Anti-Defamation League, strongly denounced Trump’s rhetoric and said it would “redirect” all of his past donations to its No Place for Hate education program.
But as Trump denounced Iran’s missile tests and pledged to confront murders at the hands of “knife-wielding Palestinians,” many in the audience appeared to warm to his message, and any walkouts were either called off or left unnoticed.
Two other Republican presidential candidates — Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich — also spoke at the group’s annual conference Monday and made their support for Israel and opposition to the Iran deal a centerpiece of their remarks.
Clinton’s chief Democratic rival, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, was the only major candidate who skipped the meeting.
