Mays Landing, NJ — As an American of Lebanese heritage, seeing families that look like my own get bombed is heartbreaking. The deadliest moments since the brutal Lebanese civil war happened in just ten minutes of Israeli strikes, after a ceasefire excluded an entire country. Someone told me, “I feel like I’m living in a nightmare.” Relatives and friends are terrified.

The situation on the ground in Lebanon reminds me of the horrifying reports I used to read as a senior official at USAID about the human cost of conflict: the hopes and dreams destroyed for people who have nothing to do with the politics behind war.

What has happened in Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, and beyond is the result of choices made by Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu: war crimes, tragic losses for our military, and widespread destruction.

U.S. policy toward Israel needs to change. Netanyahu has dragged us into a war with Iran that is bad for America. No country should receive US aid without conditions, especially when it’s billions of dollars of military assistance. Our foreign policy should be driven by American interests. The Trump–Netanyahu pact is bad for the US and the region, and devastating for innocent people.

We should be leading with diplomacy and treating war as a last resort, working toward a future where Israelis and Palestinians can both live with dignity and security.

Bayly Winder served on the Iran policy team at the U.S. State Department (2016–2018), was a presidential appointee at USAID under Administrator Samantha Power, a non-resident scholar at the Middle East Institute, and a Fulbright scholar in Kuwait. He is a widely published author on U.S.-MENA policy. He is a Democratic candidate for congress in New Jersey’s 2nd Congressional District.

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