President Donald Trump highlighted Jared Kushner’s contributions to the newly inaugurated ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in a bizarrely tangential anecdote about his son-in-law’s marriage to daughter Ivanka as he addressed Israel’s parliament Monday.
Trump was roughly three quarters through an hourlong speech to the Knesset in Jerusalem when he began thanking his administration’s negotiating team of Kushner, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, for their work on the ceasefire.
After hailing Witkoff as a “great negotiator” who was “really good at real estate” in the years before Trump tapped him as his roving presidential envoy, Trump turned his attention to Kushner, who was brought in to help close Israeli negotiators on the deal even though he has no official role in the president’s second administration.
As Kushner looked on from a balcony above the Knesset floor, Trump said Kushner, whose family has had a long friendship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, “truly loves Israel.”
“In fact, he loves it so much that my daughter converted ... I didn't know this was going to happen,” he said.
Kushner, who is an observant Jew, married Trump’s oldest daughter Ivanka in 2009. She converted to Judaism under supervision of an Orthodox rabbi prior to the wedding.
Turning to Netanyahu, he quipped that the development in Ivanka’s life “was not in the cards for me” before telling Knesset members that she and Kushner were “so happy.”
“At least, I think they're happy. If they're not, we have a big story, right? They have a great marriage, and they're they get along great. They're best friends. They have a very special relationship,” he said.
Kushner’s role in closing the long-awaited peace deal, which has resulted in the return of all 20 living hostages taken by Hamas during the October 7 terror attacks, follows his work on a series of normalization agreements between Israel and several gulf Arab states known as the Abraham Accords.
Trump added that Kushner’s work during his first term had been “something very special.”
