With his knack for controversy, Trump drowning out GOP rivals

“Ben Carson says a Muslim shouldn’t be president, Marco Rubio compares Muslims to members of the Nazi party, and Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz have suggested we should only allow Syrian refugees to come to America if they’re Christian”.

POOL/REUTERS Netanyahu extended an invitation to meet with all presidential candidates earlier this year.

Trump, the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, made the provocative remarks after last week’s shooting that left 14 dead in California by a Muslim couple said to have been radicalised.

“I was stunned. These are Republicans and they’re prepared to sink the Republican Party”, said Frank Luntz, a longtime consultant to Republicans, independents such as Ross Perot and the news media. Luntz said the more Trump is challenged, by his rivals and especially by the press, the more his supporters like him.

Taking aim at British politicians’ criticism of him, he added: “If they were going to do this, they should have informed me prior to my major investment in this £200 million development, which will totally revitalise that vast region of Scotland”.

Perhaps the silliest take was City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito’s charge that Trump is un-American – this, from a lady who until recently was publicly declining to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

“This is a president who was highly respected by all”, Trump said on Tuesday. “It was very disappointing but it was not unexpected from a person like Trump, who has made it part of his campaign to villanize minorities”.

Trump said on “Fox & Friends” that such an insult was beneath the White House amid terror threats overseas and other serious issues.

He added: “I wish we had as much outrage about Benghazi and Hillary Clinton’s emails”.

Donald Trump’s planned visit to Israel is as welcome as a nasty headache.

Republican voters may in time decide that Mr Trump’s immoderate brand of politics is not for them and anoint Marco Rubio as their candidate instead.

Trump also raised eyebrows among some American Jews last week with an extraordinary appearance at a gathering of Jewish donors, where he was booed after refusing to endorse Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel.

Netanyahu, while saying he disagreed with Trump, dismissed their demand offhandedly, and he did well to dismiss it. A Prime Minister of Israel does not get to choose all of his visitors.

London mayor Boris Johnson immediately dismissed Trump’s comments as “complete and utter nonsense” while a spokesman for Prime Minister David Cameron called the remarks “divisive, unhelpful and quite simply wrong”.

If he doesn’t want to spend his own money, he could start fundraising in earnest.

I got one more very serious question here.

On Wednesday’s Netanyahu’s office put out a statement in which the prime minister said he rejected Trump’s proposal to bar all Muslims from entering the U.S.

Qatar Airways Chief Executive Officer Akbar Al Baker said he disagreed with the proposed ban but voiced support for Trump, saying the proposal was meant to gain political mileage.