Trump: ‘October 7 wouldn’t have happened if I was in the White House’

The murderous Hamas invasion of Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, wouldn’t have happened had he been in office, former U.S. President Donald Trump told Fox & Friends on Tuesday.

“It would have never happened if I was president. Iran was broke… They had no money for Hamas, for Hezbollah, they were broke,” he said in a “Fox & Friends” phone interview.

“They wouldn’t have done it to me. I guarantee you that. They did this because they have no respect for Biden,” the former president claimed.

It's garbled because Trump is generally incoherent but I think Trump is saying that the Hamas attack on Israel happened because the Israelis "got soft" here.

He goes on to say that dead people in Ukraine and Russia and Israel would be "leading great lives" if he was in office. pic.twitter.com/x6GpYk1BZ3

— Matthew Gertz (@MattGertz) March 5, 2024

Trump has largely avoided commenting on the war between Israel and the Hamas terrorists during the ongoing election campaign, and has instead stressed that the war wouldn’t have happened on his watch.

As president, in January 2020 Trump ordered the assassination of Iran’s commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani, in one of the most high-profile U.S. strikes against the Mullah regime in Iran.

Regarding the IDF’s operations in the Gaza Strip, Trump said: “You’ve gotta finish the problem. You had a horrible invasion [that] took place.”

The former president then attacked his U.S. President Joe Biden, claiming that he was “abandoning Israel,” before adding, “But I don’t think he knows where he is actually. I think you could ask him a question right now, ask him the same question and I don’t think he knows what to say, about many subjects, actually.”

The “fascists and the communists [who] surround him” are making the calls, not Biden, Trump said.

In response to U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris’ strongly-worded call for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza, Trump repeated his position that the whole situation wouldn’t have happened on his watch.

“This attack on Israel, and likewise, Israel’s counterattack – which is what it is – would never have happened if I was president. It’s so horrible to watch it.”

He also repeated his claim that the 2020 U.S. election was stolen from him, adding: “All these people that are dead in Ukraine and Russia and Israel all these areas that are destroyed. People would be leading great lives right now.”

Following the interview, NBC asked the Trump campaign for comment, which published the following statement: “President Trump did more for Israel than any American President in history, and he took historic action in the Middle East that created unprecedented peace.”

“When President Trump is back in the Oval Office, Israel will once again be protected, Iran will go back to being broke, terrorists will be hunted down, and the bloodshed will end,” stated Trump’s National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.