Gregg Roman

Middle East Forum

@greggroman

Executive Director of @MEForum

Philadelphia, PA greggroman.com Joined February 2011

2.4K Following 3.5K Followers 3.7K Posts

Latest posts 5

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Gregg Roman @greggroman 5d

Every party that loses an election looks for someone to blame, and the argument over why Republicans lost the House and the Senate on Tuesday has already begun. Because the war with Iran helped decide the vote, that argument will be fought over foreign policy, and it will run all the way to the 2028 presidential nomination. meforum.org/mef-reports/th…

www.meforum.org The Blame America First Right Curt Mills and the Unmaking of Conservative Foreign Policy

Gregg Roman @greggroman Oct 27

8 things to know about the @Israel election results:

1. No one has 61 seats, the number required to form a government. Channel @kann_news, 12 and 13 all show Netanyahu's bloc at 50, the change bloc at 52 and the Arab parties at 18. That's down from the 64 seats his coalition won in 2022. The right-leaning channels show him higher: 60 on Ch 14, 55 on i24 and 53 on Ch 16. Either way, both blocs fall short.

2. Likud is still the largest party. It gets 24 to 30 seats across all 6 polls. @Gadi_Eisenkot's Yashar is second at 19 to 23. @Netanyahu lost his majority but is still the leader of the biggest party, and he stays prime minister as caretaker until a new government is sworn in.

3. These are exit polls, not results. About 600,000 double-envelope ballots (soldiers, diplomats, voters away from home) are counted last, by Thursday. They're widely expected to lean right. A 1 or 2 seat swing changes the math. Real results should come around midday Thursday, and official results by Nov 4.

4. Turnout is the story. It hit 77.7%, the highest since 2001, with 5.7 million voters. Arab turnout was 64.3% by late afternoon, compared with 39% at the same point last time. Netanyahu called that turnout an "emergency" during the day. It's what puts the Arab parties at 17 to 18 seats.

5. The Arab parties are now the kingmakers. Eisenkot can reach 61 only with them. That means either Ra'am joins the government, as it did under Bennett in 2021, or the Joint List supports it from outside. The Joint List's stated conditions include a path to Palestinian statehood. Democrats leader Lazimi is already urging a government with Mansour Abbas. Eisenkot is promising a "Zionist conscription government." Reading that as a hint he won't rely on the Joint List is my inference, not something he has said.

6. What Eisenkot said: the polls show "a complete vote of no confidence in Netanyahu and the government of October 7," and he "will act immediately to replace" it. Sa'ar's reply: "The left is celebrating too early." Netanyahu hasn't spoken yet.

7. On Iran and Hezbollah, both blocs are hawkish. The difference is pace, not direction. Eurasia Group expects a change government to review the Iran strategy before any new escalation. The real policy question is what a government that relies on the Joint List would give up on Gaza and the Palestinian Authority.

8. US angle: @realDonaldTrump restated his "complete and total" support for Netanyahu before the polls opened. If the result is a deadlock, expect weeks of coalition talks and possibly another election.

Gregg Roman @greggroman Oct 19

Your imaginary friend?

x.com/efischberger/s…

Hamad AlMuftah Verified account @hmmm1983 Oct 19

Yesterday, I asked Mr @GreggRoman 6 questions. He says he answered them. I made the table below to assess whether he actually did.

Score: 1 answered, 1 partly answered, 4 dodged.

Observations from his answers 👇

1. He never acknowledges a single Palestinian civilian death. My question was about the children, women, elderly and journalists killed in Gaza. His answer only discusses 7 October. And of course, he knows there was an offer days after 7 October (negotiated by mediators) to release all civilians held in Gaza : x.com/jdiamond1/stat…

2. He attacks the messenger, not the facts. Calling Al Jazeera a "propaganda channel" does not change what the US government itself concluded: Israeli gunfire was responsible for killing Shireen Abu Akleh, an American journalist.

3. His concession on question 3 matters. He agrees Israel asked Qatar to send the money to Gaza. Documents published by TIME on 18 Oct go further: Israeli officials pushed for the payments to continue until two weeks before 7 October. Qatar has always been proud to support Palestinian civilians - if any money went to Hamas, this is the responsibility of the Israeli government, which oversaw the mechanism.

4. On Qatar hosting Hamas, he leaves out that the Hamas office in Doha opened in coordination with Washington, and that Qatar mediated the hostage releases, including the November 2023 deal and the 2025 ceasefire.

5. He wrote that Shireen was "killed in Jenin, not Israel." So he admits Jenin is not Israel, which matches the UN position that the West Bank is occupied territory.

6. Israel Hayom is not an independent source (which he cited). Roman writes for it himself: the paper lists him as the author of at least 8 opinion pieces.

7. Gregg himself worked for the IDF (Israeli ministry of 'defense'), so he certainly cannot and is not one to speak about America first: meforum.org/gregg-roman. He told me MEF is based in Philadelphia, not DC. True, but MEF's own "Washington Project" lobbies Congress, it held a DC conference titled "Qatar: U.S. Ally or Global Menace?", and in 2023 it said it was working with Congress to designate Qatar a state sponsor of terrorism. The address is Philadelphia; the campaign against Qatar is on Capitol Hill in DC and his x account says he is based in Israel

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Gregg Roman @greggroman Oct 18

Arab leaders who fight Islamists at home have warned Europe for years. Europe keeps treating it as an opinion. Brussels in 2022, Berlin in 2023, Amsterdam in 2024 and now Paris in 2026 should have listened to @AlsisiOfficial in 2019.

0:35

Gregg Roman @greggroman Oct 18

Leaving so soon, Hamad? You tagged me, demanded answers, got six of them, and now you are thanking me for my time.

You say my answers show whom I represent. Easy: the Middle East Forum, which takes no money from any government. You represent a terror supporting tyrannical government. That is the difference between us.

On your poster: being a U.S. ally and financing Hamas are not mutually exclusive. Pakistan was a major non-NATO ally while Osama bin Laden lived in Abbottabad.

Your poster leads with President Trump. In June 2017 he said, "The nation of Qatar, unfortunately, has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level." It quotes President Obama. His Treasury said Qatar "has for many years openly financed Hamas." It quotes Biden officials. In November 2024 the Biden administration told you Hamas's presence in Doha was "no longer acceptable."

You posted the compliments. Washington also wrote the audit of your underwriting political violence and mayhem.

As for #6, I answered it. Repeating it will not turn it into an answer about the $2 billion.

So, one last time, the question you never touched: how much did Doha send, to whom, and who counted it?

Thank you for your time.

Hamad AlMuftah Verified account @hmmm1983 Oct 18

You need to answer all six questions candidly especially 6

The answers you’ve given so far aren’t good, sir. But at least they’ve shown exactly who you are and whom you represent—that’s all I was looking for. Thank you for your time.

As for the Treasury quote, allow me to share this with you, my good sir.

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