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Trump’s newest diplomatic stint is a head-scratcher.
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On Could 14, 2025, Robert Greenway, a former Nationwide Safety Council official below President Donald Trump, appeared on Fox & Pals to defend his former boss’s newest diplomatic head-scratcher – a comfy sit-down with Syria’s newly minted president, Ahmed al-Sharaa.
The assembly marked the primary time a U.S. president has met with a Syrian chief in 25 years, a diplomatic icebreaker that left many questioning if Trump merely misplaced his Rolodex of extra respected international leaders.
Fox & Pals co-host Brian Kilmeade, not often identified for his hard-hitting pushback in opposition to Trump, truly managed to boost a skeptical eyebrow this time. He reduce to the chase, reminding viewers of al-Sharaa’s not-so-glamorous previous.
“This man was a needed terrorist”
Within the phase, Kilmeade mentioned, “It’s fascinating too, as a result of this man was a needed terrorist who would have gotten you $20 million should you captured him. Now he’s bought a go well with on and a trimmed beard, and we’re greeting him, however he says he’s reformed his methods.”
For these unfamiliar, Ahmed al-Sharaa (as soon as referred to as Abu Mohammad al-Julani) rose from the murky depths of the worldwide jihadist motion to his present place as Syria’s head of state. In his earlier days, he was extra prone to be noticed clutching an AK-47 than adjusting a silk tie.
Born in Riyadh in 1982, al-Sharaa reduce his tooth within the violent underworld of al-Qaeda in Iraq, the place he frolicked as a U.S. detainee earlier than re-emerging as the top of the al-Nusra Entrance, al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate. This similar al-Nusra Entrance, by the best way, earned its terrorist stripes by preventing each Syrian authorities forces and rival jihadists alike – an actual overachiever within the chaos division.
In a twist befitting a late-season plot arc, al-Sharaa declared his “independence” from al-Qaeda in 2016, rebranding his group as Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
Trump’s “large, stunning” plan to rewrite Center East playbook
So, why did Trump, a person with a self-proclaimed present for sizing individuals up, sit down with this questionable character? It’s all a part of his ‘large, stunning’ plan to rewrite the Center East playbook.
The assembly, reportedly brokered by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, is a part of a broader push to reintegrate Syria into the worldwide fold. Trump, at all times one for grand gestures, even floated the thought of Syria becoming a member of the Abraham Accords, normalizing relations with Israel – a transfer that would definitely flip heads, if not stomachs.
In fact, not everyone seems to be on board. Greenway, doing his greatest to place a sophisticated spin on the entire affair, argued that participating with al-Sharaa is a obligatory evil if the U.S. hopes to curb Iranian affect in Syria and stabilize the area.
In different phrases, Washington’s overseas coverage has as soon as once more veered into the morally murky waters of ‘higher the satan you realize.’ Time will inform if this newest Center East gamble ends in a diplomatic coup or one other overseas coverage hangover.