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The curious choice of pro-Hezbollah Imam Husham al-Husainy to offer a prayer at Trump’s inauguration has brought new attention to Massad Boulos, whom Trump has appointed to be his senior adviser on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs. Massad Boulos is a Lebanese-American billionaire businessman who campaigned for Trump among Arab voters in Michigan, and helped to persuade enough of them to vote Republican so that Trump won that state. Boulos also happens to be the father of Michael Boulos, who is the husband of Trump’s daughter Tiffany. Now he has been rewarded for his help in Michigan, and for his status as Tiffany Trump’s father-in-law, with this appointment to serve as Trump’s senior adviser on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs. It’s a bit worrisome because Boulos, though Greek Orthodox, has ties to a Christian Lebanese named Franjieh, who happens to be a political ally of Hezbollah.
More on Massad Boulos and his appointment can be found here: “Trump Picks Massad Boulos to Serve as Adviser on Arab, Middle Eastern Affairs,” Algemeiner, December 1, 2024:
US President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday said Lebanese American businessman Massad Boulos would serve as senior adviser on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs.
Trump made the announcement on Truth Social. Boulos, the father-in-law of Trump’s daughter Tiffany, met repeatedly with Arab American and Muslim leaders during the election campaign.
It was the second time in recent days that Trump chose the father-in-law of one of his children to serve in his administration.
On Saturday, Trump said that he had picked his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s father, real estate mogul Charles Kushner, to serve as US ambassador to France.
In recent months, Boulos campaigned for Trump to drum up Lebanese and Arab American support, even as the US-backed Israel’s military campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Boulos has powerful roots in both countries.
His father and grandfather were both figures in Lebanese politics and his father-in-law was a key funder of the Free Patriotic Movement, a Christian party aligned with Hezbollah….
The Christians in Lebanon are split over Hezbollah. Those Christians who belong to the Free Patriotic Movement support closer ties with Hezbollah, and it is this group with which Boulos’ family has been aligned. His father -in-law was a major funder of the FPM. The Christians of the Lebanese Forces Party, on the other hand, are resolutely anti-Hezbollah. Boulos has contacts with them, too, but is not their supporter.
Trump wants the wars in the Middle East to end. That is, he has said he wants the Israelis to “hurry up” and “finish the job,” which sounds as if he is intent on IDF winding up victorious campaigns in both Gaza and in Lebanon. As to the war against Hezbollah, that has ended in a ceasefire with humiliating terms for the Lebanese Shi’a group. It is being monitored to make sure that this time, as opposed to what happened between 2006 and 2023, Hezbollah will comply with the conditions set down. In 2006, Hezbollah refused to comply, as it had promised, with UN Security Council Resolution 1701, and did not pull its forces back from the area between the Litani River and the border with Israel. Instead, Hezbollah remained in southern Lebanon, bringing in more weapons and hiding them, digging tunnels that went from southern Lebanon into northern Israel, and placing their combatants in villages across the area.
If this appointment by Trump is just a way of rewarding a supporter who performed outreach with Arab voters in Michigan, or of satisfying the desire of someone who is a relative by marriage, and wants to feel he is more than just a billionaire businessman (they’re a dime-a-dozen in Trump’s circle), that’s okay. But if Trump in fact listens to Boulos’ views on the Middle East, and in particular to his willingness to be aligned with, or linked to, Hezbollah, and with the Christian group that favors close ties to Hezbollah, Suleiman Frangieh’s Free Patriotic Movement, then there would be cause for alarm. The pending appearance of Husham al-Husainy confirms that there is considerable cause for alarm.
Oh great