1) In defending Trump's Jerusalem decision, every single thing @billmaher says here in his historical summary of Israel is false: pic.twitter.com/MW7abrDvFY — Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) January 27, 2018

On Friday night, Bill Maher acknowledged the rare occurrence that something aligns him with President Trump.

Because his show was off the air in December, Maher revisited Trump’s decision to declare Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv.

“I hate to agree with Donald Trump but it doesn’t happen often, but I do,” Maher said. “I don’t know why Israel––it has been their capital since 1949. It is where their government is. They’ve won all the wars thrown against them. I don’t understand why they don’t get to have their capital where they want.”

The Real Time host understands that there are “repercussions,” but after getting pushback from the panel, he backed Israel.

“What’s making the two-state solution impossible is that one party is perpetually hostile, a coiled snake,” Maher continued.

Maher clashed with New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg when she invoked the checkpoints Palestinians face when entering and leaving Israel, but he defended the checkpoints because of the bombings that occurred on a daily basis.

“They put up those checkpoints because there was an intifada!” he told Goldberg. “And they were having bombings every day––a pizza parlor or a bus stop was getting blown up. That’s why they built it!”

He continued:

“Israel gave back Gaza and what was the result? Did they use the funds to build schools and hospitals? No, they used them to build tunnels, to get weapons in. And they invited Hamas to shell Israel across the border.”

You can watch a clip above, via HBO.

[image via screengrab]

— —

Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac

Have a tip we should know? [email protected]