President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday named Massad Boulos, a Lebanese-American businessman and father-in-law of Trump's daughter Tiffany, as senior adviser for Arab and Middle Eastern affairs.
Boulos orchestrated Trump's campaign efforts to interact the Arab-American community in Michigan, organizing dozens of meetings in areas with large Arab-American populations angered by Democratic President Joe Biden's support for Israeli offensives in Gaza and Lebanon. Trump won the bulk Arab-American city of Dearborn Heights on his solution to capturing Michigan and other swing states.
“He has long been a champion of Republican and conservative values, an asset to my campaign, and has been instrumental in building tremendous new coalitions with the Arab American community,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Trump and Boulos have said the Republican president-elect will bring peace to the Middle East, but neither has publicly offered specific details about Trump's plans for the region.
Boulos had previously sought office in Lebanon and has long-standing ties to political figures within the country. Other Trump favorites for key national security positions include staunch supporters of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a Trump ally.
Mike Huckabee, Trump's alternative for ambassador to Israel, consistently rejects a Palestinian state within the Israeli-occupied territories. He has claimed that “there really is no such thing” as Palestinians, referring to the descendants of people that lived in Palestine before the founding of Israel.
Trump's nominee for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, advocated rebuilding a biblical Jewish temple on the positioning of Al-Aqsa Mosque, one in every of Islam's holiest sites.
Boulos helped exploit divisions inside the Democratic base over support for Israel's offensive in Gaza, where health officials say greater than 44,000 people have died within the Hamas-controlled territory since Hamas' attacks on October 7, 2023 Civilians and fighters of their total number.
Trump won Michigan by just over 10,000 votes in 2016 and Biden recaptured the state for Democrats in 2020 by about 154,000 votes. Trump defeated Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris in November with 49.7% of the vote.
“Massad is a dealmaker and a steadfast supporter of peace in the Middle East,” Trump said on Truth Social.
Trump, who has long placed members of the family and their relatives in key positions, is signaling he’ll lead his second administration in the identical way. On Saturday, he announced that he was nominating real estate developer Charles Kushner, father of Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, as ambassador to France.
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