[Craving even more FPM content? Sign up for FPM+ to unlock exclusive series, virtual town-halls with our authors, and more. Click here to sign up.]
Steve Witkoff, the real estate tycoon turned international negotiator, has become the subject of controversy with some conservatives attacking him and others rushing out to defend him.
“In a world left in chaos thanks to Joe Biden, Steve Witkoff is the diplomat America needs right now,” Sen. Jim Banks claimed.
Tucker Carlson hailed Witkoff as “the most effective American diplomat in a generation.”
But Witkoff, whatever his flaws, is far more honest than his PR men on X or Capitol Hill, and has never denied that he was just implementing the policies of the Biden administration.
In Jan, at Mar-a-Lago, Witkoff stated that “the Biden administration is the tip of the spear” in the Hamas negotiations. Biden has “got a solid team, and I appreciated that they’re allowing us to be collaborative.”
“I think Steve Witkoff has been a terrific partner in this,” Secretary of State Blinken praised him on MSNBC.
Much later, Witkoff told Tucker, “When I first got in and I was talking to Brett McGurk, who was the envoy on behalf of Biden, he was a smart guy.”
“He said to me, ‘This is where I want to get to, Steve.’ And so when I went in there, I went in with the imprimatur of the president.”
“Steve became a close partner of mine, I think it’s safe to say a friend,” McGurk told PBS.
Whose deal was it really?
Witkoff admitted to FOX News that he “had nothing to do with the mathematics behind the prisoner release and the hostage release”. The deal’s terms were set “months ago in the so-called May 27 protocol that was agreed to by Hamas, by the Israelis, and monitored by the United States under the Biden administration” and “our job was to speed up the process.”
And where did the May 27 protocol come from?
On a May 31 call, an unnamed senior Biden administration official told reporters that the proposed deal was “nearly identical to Hamas’s own proposals of only a few weeks ago”.
Witkoff’s achievement was taking a Biden administration proposal “nearly identical” to the Hamas demands and lending some muscle to the Biden team to push it through. That is why Biden officials like Blinken and McGurk praised Witkoff for enlisting Trump to bail them out.
There’s plenty of reasons to be critical of Witkoff, but he has been honest about what he was doing, giving credit to the Biden team, and admitting that he was advancing their agenda.
The same cannot be said of his defenders.
In his op-ed, Sen. Jim Banks claimed that Witkoff had stepped “into a leadership vacuum” and that “globalist critics continue to chirp from the sidelines, frustrated largely because Witkoff is shaking things up” and that problems “can’t be solved with old-school globalist solutions.”
Witkoff proposed a 10-15 year UN rebuilding program and allowing Hamas to stay on in Gaza. Rather than ending the war, the Biden ceasefire he worked for unwound into another war. As a result of the deal, the Trump administration sent another $134 million in aid to Gaza.
This isn’t “shaking things up” and Witkoff’s solutions are the same “old-school globalist solutions”. When a man is being praised by Blinken and the entire Biden old guard, the last thing he can be accused of doing is shaking things up. And Witkoff doesn’t claim that he is.
What new solutions has Witkoff come up with? The Obama ones. Negotiate with terrorists. Pretend they’re reasonable. Give them what they want. Act confused when it doesn’t work out.
According to Banks, “Witkoff’s key to successful negotiation is straightforward, admitting that deals only work when they benefit all parties.” According to Tucker, this is “so different from the posture that the last couple of generations of diplomats have taken, which is like, here’s what we want. Shut up and do it.” When did Obama or Clinton ever talk like that to America’s enemies?
Figuring out what the terrorists want and trying to give it to them were the signature diplomatic policies of the Carter, Clinton and Biden administrations. Those are the “old-school globalist solutions” which is why President Trump is such a breath of fresh air and Witkoff isn’t.
Witkoff’s initial Iran proposals pick up where Obama’s Iran Deal left off.
After reports emerged that the administration would let Iran keep a ‘civilian’ nuclear program, Witkoff appeared to suggest that the goal was Obama’s old capping enrichment gimmick.
“Iran “does not need to enrich past 3.67%. In some circumstances, they’re at 60%, in other circumstances 20%. That cannot be,” Witkoff argued. “You do not need to run — as they claim — a civil nuclear program where you’re enriching past 3.67%.”
Capping Iran’s nuclear enrichment at 3.67% had been the objective of Obama’s Iran Deal.
Obama had falsely claimed that his deal would force Iran to “keep its level of uranium enrichment at 3.67% — significantly below the enrichment level needed to create a bomb.”
The 3.67% was an Obama bait-and-switch.
“This would be a serious mistake because reactor grade uranium (3-5% enriched) can be quickly enriched to weapons grade,” Fred Fleitz, vice chair of the America First Policy Institute, warned, showing that 3.5% could go to 90% in only months. “Given Iran’s secret nuclear weapons research, Iran cannot be trusted to do ANY uranium enrichment.”
Witkoff has since reversed course and stated that Iran must stop and eliminate enrichment.
But the 3.67% number was revealing of where Witkoff gets his ideas. The enrichment cap and the talk of verification on enrichment were xeroxed right from Obama, Biden and the EU.
In 2023, Brett McGurk, Witkoff’s pal, had been dispatched by the Biden administration to offer Iran sanctions relief in exchange for freezing some of its nuclear enrichment.
It may not be a new idea, but Witkoff’s defenders are the only ones who accuse him of having new ideas. The Obama and Biden pros recognize that Witkoff is following in their footsteps.
Whatever Witkoff’s agendas are, he’s in over his head, and he outsourced his negotiations to everyone from the Biden team to the Islamic terror state of Qatar with whom he’s done business and whose terrorist leaders he has repeatedly praised. Knowing nothing about the Middle East hasn’t given him a fresh perspective: it just made him an easy dupe for everyone who does.
“I thought we had a deal — an acceptable deal. I even thought we had an approval from Hamas,” Witkoff had told FOX News. “Maybe that’s just me getting duped.”
It’s an honest admission. Witkoff’s defenders who pretend that he’s a genius shaking up diplomacy by appeasing Islamic terrorist states could at least try to be as honest as him.
