‘We flipped the script’: Pompeo’s fight for Israel and peace

“It took President Trump and our team to acknowledge that no, you could build peace, you could build stability,” Pompeo said.

By Josh Plank, World Israel News

At a Combat Anti-Semitism Movement (CAM) virtual summit Monday, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo described how, as part of the Trump administration, he helped fight anti-Semitism, make peace in the Middle East, and turn conventional wisdom on its head.

CAM awarded Pompeo with its first-ever Global Leadership Award for “his exceptional and groundbreaking contributions to the fight against anti-Semitism and religious prejudice of all forms, his deep and steadfast friendship with the Jewish people and the State of Israel, and his role in crafting the Abraham Accords.”

“Long before I entered government service, I knew the importance of Israel to the United States as a security partner, and I knew the history of the hatred of Jewish people,” Pompeo said.

Pompeo described himself as an evangelical Christian and said that he has taken great interest in reading the history of the Hebrew Bible.

“I understood that we had to get this fight against anti-Semitism right. We needed to put every piece of energy we had into that fight,” he said.

“It was something that was important for me personally as a man of faith, but also my duty to the United States and my moral obligation to people of all faiths around the world,” he said.

Pompeo described himself as “incredibly optimistic” about the future of the Abraham Accords.

“Why I’m optimistic is because I think now we’ve unleashed this. I think this is happening. It took an American leadership team that was prepared to help facilitate it, but now I think it will stand the test of time,” he said.

Pompeo said that for decades and decades, foreign policy experts insisted that if you can’t resolve the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, “no dice,” you can’t advance peace and stability in the region.

“The great news is that was just all wrong,” he said. “It took President Trump and our team to acknowledge that no, you could build peace, you could build stability.”

Pompeo said that the Abraham Accords would not have been possible if the U.S. had not changed its policy toward Iran “180 degrees from how the previous administration had addressed that issue.”

“We came in and just flipped the script,” he said.

When asked what stood out to him most about the State of Israel during his many visits, Pompeo said, “It’s always the people.”

He described Israelis as “good people of good will, trying to do the right thing for themselves, for their families, for their community, for their nation.”

“And this is what I’ll remember about Israel. These are remarkable people,” he said.

Abraham Accordsanti-SemitismMike Pompeo