Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) National President Morton A. Klein and ZOA Director of Research and Special Projects Liz Berney, Esq. released the following statement:
ZOA congratulates President Trump on his inauguration, and strongly praises and thanks President Trump for his series of great executive orders (described below) on Day One of his new term in office.
ZOA was the only major Jewish organization to honor President Trump after his first term in office. ZOA also wrote a book chapter describing President Trump’s many accomplishments for Israel and the Jewish people during his first term.
ZOA President Morton Klein presents Pres. Donald Trump with the ZOA’s Herzl Gold Medallion
We hope that during his second term, President Trump will continue and expand upon his great accomplishments; oppose a Palestinian state, which would pose an existential threat to Israel; do his utmost to pressure Hamas and Qatar; deal with other threats such as Egypt’s build-up of arms endangering Israel; pressure the Palestinian Authority to end its “pay-to-slay” payments and incitement to murder Jews; oppose or minimize releases of Palestinian Arab convicted murderers of innocent Jews; assure Israel’s qualitative military edge (QME) and military supplies; reimpose sanctions on Iran; and help Israel to destroy Iran’s nuclear capabilities.
Approximately 600,000 Americans (200,000 American voters) live in Israel – by far the largest American population in the Middle East. 80% or more of American voters in Israel voted for Trump, and many of their votes counted in swing states. Hamas murdered at least 33 Americans on October 7 and took 12 Americans hostage – the largest American hostage-taking since Iranians seized our Teheran embassy. Americans here and abroad wish President Trump a successful term that puts safety first.
The President’s great Day One Executive Orders include: Revoking Biden’s anti-Jewish sanctions on Jews in Judea/Samaria; Revoking Biden’s revocation of Trump’s prior sanctions against ICC officials; withdrawing the U.S. from the biased WHO UN agency; ending promotion of the racist discriminatory DEI; protecting the U.S. from foreign terrorists and public safety threats – which will hopefully assist with deporting foreign pro-Hamas, etc. students who are attacking Jews on college campuses; reevaluating foreign aid; and (according to press reports) lifting Biden’s restrictions on shipping weapons to Israel. ZOA’s discussion of these orders is below:
(1) Revoking Biden’s anti-Jewish sanctions: ZOA strongly praises President Trump for revoking Biden’s despicable Executive Order 14115 (Feb. 1, 2024), which the Biden administration used to unconstitutionally impose draconian sanctions on certain Jewish individuals and organizations in Judea/Samaria, without investigation, based on anti-Israel groups’ (such as pro-Hamas DAWN) unsupported claims that those Jewish individuals and groups “undermin[ed] peace, security, and stability in the West Bank.” Some individuals were fighting Hamas in Gaza while the Biden administration sanctioned them for supposedly undermining peace in the West Bank. The Biden administration even named the wrong individual in one of its improper sanctions orders. Sickeningly, just five days before leaving office, Biden issued an order extending his anti-Jewish sanctions regime another year, to Feb. 1, 2026. Two Jewish U.S. citizens who were victims of Biden’s sanctions recently sued the Biden administration for denying them any semblance of due process or equal protection. Moreover, the Biden sanctions egregiously ignored the real threats to “peace, security and stability in the West Bank” – namely, the constant deadly attacks by Palestinian Arabs on Jews living in the Jewish homeland. (See “ZOA Condemns Biden’s Antisemitic Executive Order Sanctioning Jews in Judea/Samaria While Ignoring Arab Terrorists,” Feb. 7, 2024.)
(2) Revoking Biden’s revocation of Trump’s prior sanctions against ICC officials: During President Trump’s first term in office, Trump issued Executive Order 13928 (June 11, 2020), which sanctioned and blocked entry into the United States of International Criminal Court (ICC) officials. These sanctions were needed due to the lawless ICC’s “illegitimate assertions of jurisdiction over personnel of the United States and certain of its allies” [meaning Israel], including the ICC Prosecutor’s illegitimate investigations; the ICC’s infringements of U.S. and allies’ sovereignty; and the ICC’s threats “to subject current and former United States Government and allied officials to harassment, abuse, and possible arrest.” The ICC has no legitimate jurisdiction over the U.S. or Israel, because neither is a signatory to or ratifier of the Rome statute creating the court.
Unfortunately, shortly after becoming president, Biden issued Executive Order 14022 (April 1, 2021), revoking and terminating the sanctions and entry restrictions that Pres. Trump had previously imposed on ICC officials. Yet, the need for sanctioning ICC officials became even more pressing during Biden’s term in office, because, despite having no jurisdiction to do so, the ICC moved forward with illegitimately investigating Israel, and issued arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant. (See “ZOA Op-Ed: Reimpose Sanctions on Anti-Israel Intl Criminal Court,” by Morton A. Klein, Dec. 2, 2021.)
ZOA praises President Trump for revoking Biden’s revocation of Trump’s important, much-needed sanctions against ICC officials. We hope that the revocation of Biden’s revocation means that the sanctions in Pres. Trump’s prior Executive Order 13928 are automatically imposed. However, to be certain, Pres. Trump may need to reissue the sanctions. Moreover, to avoid the possibility that a future administration will again revoke Trump’s sanctions executive order, ZOA urges the Senate to pass the Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act (passed by the House on January 9 as H.R.23), codifying the sanctions against ICC officials who are illegitimately attempting to “investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute any protected person of the United States and its allies.”
(3) “Withdrawing the United States from the World Health Organization”: In 2020, Pres. Trump withdrew from the United Nation’s World Health Organization (WHO) for multiple reasons, including WHO’s disproportionate, unfair, onerous fees charged to the U.S. (22% of WHO’s budget) and WHO’s “inability to demonstrate independence from the inappropriate political influence of WHO member states.”
Although not mentioned in any of the executive orders, WHO’s anti-Israel propaganda is a prime example of WHO’s biased subservience to inappropriate political influences. WHO falsely calls Gaza, Judea/Samaria etc. “occupied Palestinian Territory” and adopted and continues to spread Hamas’ and UNRWA’s false allegations regarding “civilian” Gazan casualties and conditions.
Unfortunately, on President Biden’s first day in office in 2021, Biden retracted President Trump’s appropriate withdrawal from WHO. President Trump has now revoked Biden’s retraction, and thankfully, is again withdrawing the U.S. from WHO. Withdrawing from and ceasing U.S. contributions to WHO is an important step for ending the shameful sending of U.S. funds to U.N. organizations that propagandize for Hamas and other anti-American and anti-Israel groups.
(4) Ending radical, racist, discriminatory DEI programs and preferencing, and revoking Biden’s executive orders promoting DEI: “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion” (DEI) often causes and inspires attacks and discrimination against Jews, by dividing the world into “oppressors” and “oppressed” and labeling Jews and Israel as “oppressors.” (See, e.g., “How DEI Inspires Jew-Hatred,” by Stanley Goldfarb, City Jn’l, Nov. 2, 2023.) As Florida Governor Ron DeSantis noted when he banned DEI from Florida’s public colleges and universities, “If you look at the way this has actually been implemented across the country, DEI is better viewed as standing for discrimination, exclusion and indoctrination.” President Trump’s orders were an important step in the right direction.
(5) “Protecting The United States From Foreign Terrorists And Other National Security And Public Safety Threats”: ZOA very much appreciates Pres. Trump’s executive order to protect Americans from foreign terrorists and public safety threats, by enhancing vigilance in the visa-issuance process, and by ensuring “that admitted aliens and aliens otherwise already present in the United States do not bear hostile attitudes toward its citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles, and do not advocate for, aid, or support designated foreign terrorists and other threats to our national security.”
We believe that this executive order can be a great help in removing from campuses and deporting foreign pro-Hamas, “we are Hamas,” and pro-Hezbollah students who have been harassing and attacking Jewish and other students.
(6) “Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid”: This executive order calls for a 90-day pause and reevaluation of foreign aid programs. We hope that this reevaluation will result in:
(a) Eliminating all U.S. aid to UNRWA. UNRWA is the Hamas-permeated UN organization that participated in murdering Israelis on October 7; employs Hamas members and hides Hamas control centers and weapons; continues to teach Jew-hatred to Gazan children; and maintains Palestinian Arabs’ descendants as pawns to attack Israel – instead of peaceably resettling them.
(b) Eliminating all U.S. aid benefitting the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinian Authority still continues to incite deadly terror against Israelis and continues to pay its gruesome “pay-to-slay” payments to terrorists for murdering Jews.
(c) Reevaluating and reducing aid to Egypt – at least until Egypt withdraws its huge buildup of troops and advanced weaponry in Sinai, aimed at Israel, all in violation of the Camp David agreements; and opens its doors to Gazans who wish to leave Gaza and resettle in Egypt or elsewhere.
(7) Reports of exec. order lifting weapons shipment restrictions that Biden had imposed on Israel: News reports state that Pres. Trump signed such an executive order. We haven’t seen the order yet, but are thrilled if the president indeed signed this.