On an April 16, 2026 episode of his show, Tucker Carlson claimed that “Israelism” has effectively become America’s state religion. According to him, President Trump ruthlessly cuts off anyone who refuses to show unconditional loyalty to Israel—pointing to Trump’s public feuds with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and former congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene.
But the breaks Tucker points to—and the broader rift with high-profile conservative voices like Tucker himself, Megyn Kelly, Alex Jones, and Candace Owens—did not stem from insufficient support for Israel. They stemmed from an increasingly obsessive opposition to it. These figures turned on Trump precisely because he maintained an alliance with Israel and pursued a hardline policy toward Iran—positions he has articulated for nearly five decades.
In their zeal, they constructed a conspiracy theory: that Israel had somehow manipulated or forced the United States into war with Iran. They accused Trump of endangering American lives, betraying American interests, and even went so far as to encourage military insubordination. That—not any failure of loyalty to Israel—is what turned them into liabilities Trump ultimately distanced himself from.
The Massie and Greene Breaks: When Obsession Turned Personal
The rupture with Greene and Massie resulted from a fixation on Israel that escalated into direct attacks on Trump.
Greene’s record is well established. In August 2025, she became the only Republican in Congress to accuse Israel of committing a so-called “genocide” in Gaza—a false narrative that has been repeatedly debunked. She has also suggested Israel played a role in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, and in 2018 promoted the claim that California wildfires were ignited by a space laser controlled by the Jewish Rothschild banking family.
Over time, that fixation sharpened into open hostility toward Trump. She began accusing him of prioritizing Israel over the American people, demanded he spend less time on foreign affairs, and repeatedly suggested that he was being controlled by a “foreign government,” her thinly veiled reference to Israel. She even attacked fellow Christians for visiting the Western Wall, a site of religious significance in Christianity, claiming they too were under Israeli influence.
Greene then pushed the theory that Israel was preventing Trump from releasing the Epstein files, without any evidence. She amplified that claim while working with Democrats to force their release. On November 15, 2025—one day after publicly suggesting Trump was being controlled by Israel in the Epstein matter—Trump publicly disavowed her as a “raving lunatic.”
He made no mention of Israel, yet Greene nevertheless insisted Israel was the reason.
Massie followed a parallel path. A longtime critic of AIPAC who boycotted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s congressional address, Massie explicitly tied the Epstein files to Israel. He repeatedly suggested they were being withheld because Epstein had ties to the Israeli government, implying a cover-up involving a “foreign government”—again, Israel—and accused Trump of protecting those connections.
But with Massie, it went further. He was one of the few Republicans to oppose Trump’s “Big Beautiful” spending bill. Like Greene, he worked with Democrats to force a vote on releasing the Epstein files. And in June 2025, he joined Democrats in attempting to block Trump’s authority to strike Iran.
That was the breaking point. When Trump cut ties, he cited Massie’s repeated defiance—especially his refusal to acknowledge the threat posed by Iran. Israel was never mentioned.
The Influencer Revolt: Foreign Policy as Flashpoint
The more explosive break—with Tucker, Kelly, Jones, and Owens—came after the United States launched a war against Iran alongside Israel.
These commentators, once aligned with Trump, erupted at his clear refusal to adopt their anti-Israel narrative. They accused him of betraying “America First,” claiming he had subordinated U.S. interests to Israel. They advanced the now-familiar claim that Israel had “dragged” America into war.
Tucker, in particular, hammered the point repeatedly on his show. He said the U.S. acted “at the behest and then demand of Israel,” called Trump a “slave” to the Jewish state, and claimed Netanyahu had steered Washington into conflict. Kelly, Jones, and Owens echoed similar themes.
But this narrative ignores a central fact: Trump’s stance on Iran long predates these events. In a 1987 interview with Barbara Walters, Trump warned that weakness toward Iran would invite catastrophe and even suggested seizing Iranian oil infrastructure if provoked. He voiced these concerns repeatedly over the next four decades.
Trump himself rejected the idea that Israel manipulated him.
“I might have forced their hand,” he said in March 2026. “We were negotiating with these [Iranian] lunatics, and I believed they were going to attack first… If anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand.”
Nor are concerns about a nuclear Iran uniquely Israeli or American. Governments across the West—including those of France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the European Union, Canada, and Australia—have raised alarms. Even regional rivals of Israel, such as Saudi Arabia, have warned about Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Saudi Arabia had urged Trump to attack Iran, yet received no condemnation from the Israel critics.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt dismissed the idea that Trump acted at Israel’s direction as “laughable.”
Crossing the Line: From Criticism to Defiance
The conflict reached its peak in early April 2026. Tucker explicitly urged White House officials and U.S. military personnel to refuse orders related to potential strikes on Iran—including any involving weapons of mass destruction.
“If you work in the White House or in the U.S. military, now is the time to say no—absolutely not,” he said, adding that those close to Trump should resign or do whatever they legally could to stop him.
Others escalated as well. Kelly accused Trump of fighting “Israel’s war” and sending Americans to “die for Israel.” On April 7, Owens called for invoking the 25th Amendment and urged the military to remove Trump from office over the Iran war. Jones echoed that call.
Only after all of that—on April 9—did Trump respond, blasting them on Truth Social as “low IQ,” “losers,” “nut jobs,” and “stupid people” who, he said, secretly wanted Iran to obtain nuclear weapons.
Takeaway
Trump did not purge allies for not supporting Israel. These conservative influencers and legislators, consumed by opposition to Israel, abandoned Trump the moment his longstanding Iran policy intersected with Israeli security interests.
Greene and Massie exemplify this: their feverish blame of Israel for the “genocide” in Gaza and the Epstein files metastasized into puppet accusations, turning routine policy friction into betrayal narratives. The others followed suit, inventing a hoax of foreign hijacking, ignoring Trump’s decades-long record on Iran, urging defiance of lawful military orders, and calling for his removal. Trump responded by cutting them loose—not because they criticized Israel, but because their Israel obsession had led them to undermine his presidency and, by extension, American resolve against a documented state sponsor of terrorism.
America does not have an official religion called “Israelism.” It has a president who keeps his word on threats he has identified for nearly half a century. The real betrayal was not Trump’s alliance with Israel; it was the moment his former supporters chose their obsessions over their country.
Sources
Tucker Carlson, NBC News, The Guardian, FPIF, Facebook, Axios, Politico, Times of Israel, Politico, Times of Israel, Times of Israel, ITN, The Daily Beast, Middle East Eye, Politico, Truth Social, A News, AP, Washington Post, ABC News, X, X, X, X, Candace Owens, X, WSJ
