A New Pharaoh Arose

16 Tevet 5786

In the current parashah, Parashat Shemot, we read the following chilling words...

 "A new king arose over Egypt, who did not know of Joseph.  He said to his people, 'Behold!  the people, the Children of Israel, are more numerous and stronger than we.  Come, let us outsmart it lest it become numerous and it may be that if a war will occur, it, too, may join our enemies, and wage war against us and go up from the land.'"   (Shemot 1. 8-10)

Commentary:  "Either it was literally a new king, or an existing monarch with 'new' policies, who found it convenient to 'ignore' Joseph's monumental contributions to the country (Sotah, 11a), ...."

U.S. Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Marco Rubio was tasked at Saturday’s Trump press conference with explaining to the world what “Trump 2.0” is really like and how to deal with him. (Very important read here.)

Trump himself has drawn a distinction between his first term in office and the current one...

During his presidency and campaign, Donald Trump made several public remarks regarding his intention to focus more on the Palestinian issue during a second term, often contrasting it with his pro-Israel actions in his first term.

Key instances of these sentiments include:

First Term vs. Second Term Distinction: In September 2018, during a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the UN General Assembly, Trump stated that while achieving a peace deal was a "dream" for his first term, he planned to "do other things in my second term". He emphasized that his first-term decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital had taken "the biggest chip off the table," requiring a subsequent "fair deal" that would benefit the Palestinians.

LEARN FROM HISTORY