{"id":234451,"date":"2017-05-22T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-05-22T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/?p=234451"},"modified":"2017-05-26T11:45:35","modified_gmt":"2017-05-26T15:45:35","slug":"the-first-sitting-president-to-visit-the-western-wall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2017\/05\/22\/the-first-sitting-president-to-visit-the-western-wall\/","title":{"rendered":"Donald Trump, One-Man United Nations, Becomes the First Sitting President to Visit the Western Wall"},"content":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Trump did another first on this trip in Israel today. He made history. He\u2019s the first sitting president to visit the Western Wall. Now, other presidents have been there as candidates or after they retired, but none before Trump ever, as a sitting president. George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Hussein O all visited either when they were candidates or as private citizens. And none of them were accompanied by the Israeli prime minister. Now, an interesting thing about this. Trump and Melania went to the Western Wall today, and men and women go to different areas of the wall.<\/p>\n

The prime minister, Bibi… It\u2019s Benjamin, but Bibi to people like me, his friends. Bibi wanted to go with Trump and Trump said. “No. Respectfully, no. This is a personal thing for me. I don\u2019t want this to appear to be a political event.” So the prime minister of Israel, Bibi Netanyahu, was there but did not accompany Trump as he personally visited the wall. It\u2019s customary to write a small message and find a place in the wall to plug it, and those messages are there for eternity. I have visited this place during a five-day whirlwind trip back in 1993, and it\u2019s someplace everybody should be able to go.<\/p>\n

\"\"Whatever your faith, the Holy Land is someplace everybody should be able to go. There\u2019s nothing like actually being there and seeing it after having read and seen so much about it. So the president and Melania will have dinner with Netanyahu and his wife at Netanyahu\u2019s home, which is not part of a governmental complex. I\u2019ve been there too. Let me tell you some of this. It\u2019s been a while since I\u2019ve told some of these stories. I\u2019ll make this real brief. I got a chance to go in 1993.<\/p>\n

It was a combination religious trip and political trip. It was an opportunity to meet leaders of the day in Israel, go to the Knesset, but also visit some of the famed religious sites. I had Mossad briefings, private Mossad briefings. I was at to the Golan Heights, had interviews with all these people. These five days probably were worth a couple of years in college on this subject. They obviously had been briefed, these Israeli leaders had been briefed on who I was, obviously would happen. We met Yitzhak Rabin, who could not have been more gracious and outgoing and friendly.<\/p>\n

But when it came time to meet Shimon Peres, this is the weirdest thing. There was my entourage, if you will. When people like me travel, there\u2019s always a bunch of hangers-on, and so the hangers-on, the entourage were all ushered in to each dignitary\u2019s office and then the hangers-on (“the hitchhikers,” I call \u2019em) were then excused from the room while I and my immediate advisers had meetings with these people. Shimon Peres was nice as he could be, but he kept…<\/p>\n

While he was seated, he kept undoing his belt buckle. He sat there, undid the belt buckle and then tightened it a bit and redid it and then he\u2019d do it again and loosen it, while he was speaking. And he started talking about how we\u2019re destroying all the trees in the world. Not we, not me, but we\u2019re destroying all the trees. And it didn\u2019t take me long to realize, “This guy\u2019s been told that I am a Reaganite right-winger, and so he\u2019s jabbin\u2019 me. You know, he\u2019s just jabbing me.” (laughing)<\/p>\n

\"\"We had a guy (ahem) on our trip when we were leaving the Israeli government compound, there was a car alarm going off. Whenever there\u2019s an alarm anywhere near that place, you skedaddle. You seek cover. So they hustled us out, and we got in our transportation. As we were leaving, they told us, “Yeah, it was Shimon Peres\u2019 car alarm. No problem at all.” Later that day, we were leaving the Knesset after having met with the speaker of the Knesset — which is, of course, their version of the United States Congress — and in walks Shimon Peres. (chuckling)<\/p>\n

And one of the people traveling with me said… (chuckles) I wished I could shrink to invisible. One of the people traveling with me said, “Hey, Buddy! Did you get your car alarm fixed?” Oh, no! I\u2019m burying my face in my hands. “Oh, no! No, this isn\u2019t happening! No!” Peres maintained total aplomb and dignity and just looked at this guy like… And he said, “You are more informed than I. I have no idea to which that you refer.” (sic) “Oh, yeah, we were leaving your office and the car alarm was going off. I just hope you got it fixed.” And Peres looked at the me (laughing) with a look like, “I hope I never see you again,” (laughing) and we were off.<\/p>\n

We had been talking about that. A couple things like that happened on the trip. They always do. But it\u2019s an amazing. Trump also went to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. That is… Well, the whole thing that Trump is doing, I\u2019ve done it. And for him to do it as president in his first trip abroad says a lot about the things on his mind in terms of American foreign policy, and it\u2019s consistent. Terrorism has been at the top of his list and wiping out ISIS, and he\u2019s told every leader of every nation he\u2019s spoken to, “We gotta drive \u2019em out.”<\/p>\n

You know, other presidents go to the U.N. and make platitudinous speeches about these kinds of things. I\u2019m not trying to oversell this. Don\u2019t misunderstand. I just think it\u2019s… I haven\u2019t seen it too much if it\u2019s happened where a United States president takes it to these people face-to-face and does it in an inoffensive way, in total contrast from the way Trump is portrayed. I mean, you can find stories here: “Trump surprisingly presidential! Trump surprisingly reverential! Trump surprisingly competent! Trump surprisingly in command!”<\/p>\n

The only reason it\u2019s “surprising” is because of the way Trump is presented in the American media while at home.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Joint press conference between President Trump and Bibi Netanyahu just concluded. Let me summarize this for you. It\u2019s a completely different Netanyahu than the Netanyahu we saw with Barack Obama. I\u2019ll tell you what I remember about… It was either the first or second trip to the White House by Netanyahu. Obama was rude, he was offensive, and some would even say mean-spirited. I don\u2019t know how many of you remember this. I think this was the second, but it doesn\u2019t matter. Pick one. I just think was it the second trip.<\/p>\n