The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) apologized Tuesday to President Barack Obama for criticism by Republican frontrunner Donald J. Trump on Monday evening at the group’s annual policy conference.

Trump’s speech was greeted warmly by AIPAC members, who gave him several standing ovations, defying expectations that he would be rejected by the group, some of whose liberal members had threatened to walk out on him in protest.

The Jerusalem Post reports:

“While we may have policy differences, we deeply respect the office of the President of the United States and our President Barack Obama,” Lillian Pinkus, the newly installed president of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, said Tuesday, joined by other AIPAC lay and professional leaders. “There are people in our AIPAC family who were deeply hurt last night and for that we are deeply sorry,” Pinkus said, her voice choking. “We are deeply disappointed that so many people applauded a sentiment that we neither agree with nor condone.”

Trump’s remarks about Obama included the following:

With President Obama in his final year — yea! (LAUGHTER) (CHEERS, APPLAUSE) (LAUGHTER) He may be the worst thing to ever happen to Israel, believe me, believe me. And you know it and you know it better than anybody. … You see, what President Obama gets wrong about deal-making is that he constantly applies pressure to our friends and rewards our enemies. (CHEERS, APPLAUSE) And you see that happening all the time, that pattern practiced by the president and his administration, including former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who is a total disaster, by the way. (LAUGHTER) (CHEERS, APPLAUSE) She and President Obama have treated Israel very, very badly. (APPLAUSE)

AIPAC has not apologized to Donald Trump for the numerous attacks made from the podium against him by his rivals, including former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), which were also applauded.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. His new e-book, Leadership Secrets of the Kings and Prophets: What the Bible’s Struggles Teach Us About Today, is on sale through Amazon Kindle Direct. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.