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Joe Biden Is a Good Man and a Good President. He Must Bow Out of the Race.
Donald Trump is too grave a threat to America. Democrats need a nominee who can unite the country and articulate a compelling vision for it.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Thomas L. Friedman became the paper’s foreign affairs Opinion columnist in 1995. He joined the paper in 1981, after which he served as the Beirut bureau chief in 1982, Jerusalem bureau chief in 1984, in Washington as the diplomatic correspondent in 1989 and later the White House correspondent and economic correspondent.
Mr. Friedman was awarded the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting (from Lebanon) and the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting (from Israel). He also won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for commentary.
Mr. Friedman is the author of “From Beirut to Jerusalem,” which won the National Book Award in 1989. He has written several other books, including “Hot, Flat and Crowded,” an international best seller.
Born in Minneapolis, Mr. Friedman received a B.A. in Mediterranean studies from Brandeis University in 1975. In 1978 he received a master’s in modern Middle East studies from Oxford. His column appears every Sunday and Wednesday.
Donald Trump is too grave a threat to America. Democrats need a nominee who can unite the country and articulate a compelling vision for it.
By Thomas L. Friedman
You have to wonder if American “friends” of Israel have any clue about the nature of Israel’s government.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Our society is losing sight of qualities that kept America strong, like responsibility and civility but also the capacity to feel shame.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Netanyahu’s government can’t ignore what the world is saying about the need for a Palestinian state.
By Thomas L. Friedman
I don’t think Biden fully understands his “old friend” Netanyahu. Israeli defense officials are sending a clear warning.
By Thomas L. Friedman
In how the president made his announcement, he enabled Netanyahu to look like an innocent victim
By Thomas L. Friedman
I don’t think the protests are antisemitic. But they undercut the only fair and just solution to the war.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Netanyahu is making his nation more like the worst of the old kingdom, and the crown prince is making his kingdom more like the best of the old Jewish state.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Israel is facing one of the most fateful choices it has ever had to make.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Support leadership change in Iran, Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Without that, there’s zero chance for resolution.
By Thomas L. Friedman
There now needs to be a large, sustained, global initiative to isolate Iran.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Israel is at a strategic point in its war in Gaza and there is every indication that Benjamin Netanyahu is going to choose the wrong path.
By Thomas L. Friedman
America’s Mideast strategy depends on Israel partnering with non-Hamas Palestinians. Netanyahu is making that impossible.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Things have gone terribly wrong in Gaza. They could get worse soon.
By Thomas L. Friedman
There’s another Middle East conflict going on, and U.S. soldiers are on the front lines of it.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Israel’s very legitimacy is being undermined by the enormous casualties in Gaza and its government’s failure to provide a credible postwar plan.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Lindsey Graham, J.D. Vance, Mike Johnson and other Republicans are waving the white flag of surrender on Ukraine, all at Trump’s behest.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Neither Hamas nor Netanyahu will be a partner in the plan, but global pressure could still be effective.
By Thomas L. Friedman
What the president and the Saudi crown prince need to do.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Deep listening, to criticism and praise, is a sign of respect.
By Thomas L. Friedman
How the country and the world are defined is in Congress’s hands.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The natural world can tell us a lot about volatile political relationships.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Thomas L. Friedman on what he hopes a “Biden Doctrine” for the region will look like.
By Thomas L. Friedman and Sophia Alvarez Boyd
America’s approach to Iran, a Palestinian state and Saudi Arabia are at the heart of a possible strategic realignment in the Middle East.
By Thomas L. Friedman
This is no ordinary moment in world affairs.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Israel has been at war with Hamas for over 100 days and still has over 100 hostages to recover, but Netanyahu’s No. 1 focus is Netanyahu.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The secretary of state says the poison underlying the conflict is the inability to see the humanity of the other side.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The Israel-Hamas war was not as inevitable as you might think.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The Biden administration needs to do more than give gentle nudges on the war.
By Thomas L. Friedman
A legitimate Palestinian partner and a commitment to negotiating a two-state solution are key.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Wiping out Hamas is an unattainable goal, and getting stuck in Gaza would be a disaster.
By Thomas L. Friedman
It’s actually three wars, and there’s one keystone that we have to get right.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Chasing some rays of hope in this dark moment for Israelis and Palestinians.
By Thomas L. Friedman
It is time for a Biden peace plan.
By Thomas L. Friedman
After traveling across Israel and the West Bank, I now understand why so much has changed.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Israel, Iran, Ukraine and Russia are driving so much about geopolitics today.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Hamas will never again govern Gaza, and Israel will not govern a post-Hamas Gaza.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Threats to Israel are multipronged, including Iran and its proxies but also narratives from Western progressives and social media, Palestinians in the occupied territories and internal divisions.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Both Israelis and Palestinians must behave in ways that we can support. No more blank checks.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The Netanyahu government and President Biden have smarter options.
By Thomas L. Friedman
If you think Israel is now crazy, it is because Hamas punched it in the face. So now Israel believes it must restore deterrence by proving that it can outcrazy Hamas.
By Thomas L. Friedman
As the conflict between Israel and Hamas unfolds, the columnist Thomas Friedman shares his perspective on the evolving situation and what he’s watching for.
By Thomas L. Friedman and Vishakha Darbha
It would be a mistake to give Hamas what it wants: an overreaction like an invasion of Gaza.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The shock waves of the Hamas attack on Israel will reach Iran, Saudi Arabia and Ukraine.
By Thomas L. Friedman
That was not the plan.
By Thomas L. Friedman
With age comes wisdom.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Three questions Biden should ask Netanyahu at Wednesday’s meeting.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Ukraine is a game-changer for the West, rivaling the importance of German unification, and the European Union is the key.
By Thomas L. Friedman
In the quest for a peace and security deal, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia cannot let Netanyahu turn them into useful idiots.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Netanyahu’s power grab violates a principle that has held the country together.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Senior Biden officials are in Riyadh on Thursday exploring the possibility of some kind of U.S.-Saudi-Israeli-Palestinian understanding.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Mr. President, this Israeli government needs another dose of your tough love about our shared interests and about U.S. strategic interests.
By Thomas L. Friedman
In a rare move, President Biden publicly voiced his support for the monthslong democracy protests underway in Israel.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Israel’s extremist governing coalition is going too far on too many fronts.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The events playing out in Russia last weekend felt like the trailer for the next James Bond movie.
By Thomas L. Friedman
It’s a place where rules are for suckers, norms are for fools, truths are pliable and people of high character are banished.
By Thomas L. Friedman
My recent journey through the Middle East was unlike anything I’d ever experienced in a region that has long been my second home.
By Thomas L. Friedman
The only way to have a rational discussion about immigration is to do everything possible to secure the southern border like never before.
By Thomas L. Friedman
He will do anything to justify the terrible losses he has piled up in the name of a country where defeated leaders don’t retire peacefully.
By Thomas L. Friedman
Social media illustrated some of the perils of unchecked technology.
By Thomas L. Friedman