Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Jeb Bush at Ramaz: Iran Deal Is ‘Very Naive’

Image by getty images

(JTA) — Jeb Bush, a likely Republican presidential candidate, criticized the Iran nuclear framework agreement as “very naive” during a visit to a Manhattan Jewish day school.

Bush made the remark on Thursday in a closed-door question-and-answer session with high school students at the Ramaz Upper School, the Washington Free Beacon reported. He said the framework agreement signed last month between Iran and world powers would “create instability for a long, long while.”

“There’s some belief [in the Obama administration] that the ayatollahs will just go quietly into the night,” Bush said, according to the Free Beacon. “It’s hard for me to imagine that because while we were negotiating, [the Iranian regime] continued with the ‘Death to America’ rallies every weekend.”

The former Florida governor spoke at the prestigious modern Orthodox school in honor of Israel Independence Day. The visit was part of a short New York City fundraising trip.

Earlier in the day, Bush distanced himself from former Secretary of State James Baker, who is currently one of his foreign policy advisers, CNN reported. Baker, who is believed to have said “F*** the Jews” while serving as secretary under Bush’s father, George H.W. Bush, criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the recent J Street conference.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.