The last time North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum was in Israel in the early 1980s, shortly after he completed graduate school, Hamas had not yet come into existence. Neither had Hezbollah, the Iran-backed terror organization fighting Israel on its northern border.

But both groups dominated the North Dakota Republican’s first trip to the Jewish state as governor. The former GOP presidential candidate arrived in Israel a day before the back-to-back pager and walkie-talkie attacks on Hezbollah officials in Lebanon, meeting with senior officials as the operations were playing out.

Burgum spoke to Jewish Insider earlier this month — before Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah — about his time in Israel and how it has affected his approach to foreign policy. The following interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Jewish Insider: You were down south yesterday. How was that? 

Gov. Doug Burgum: Really powerful. Our first introduction, we had a chance to meet one of the first responders, [Nimrod Palmach]. He was one of the first ones to arrive [on Oct. 7]; just went down there on his own with a single sidearm, and when he left his house, he didn’t have his shoes on. He pulled up at a bus stop and found 23 concertgoers that had been killed. Nimrod got there and then he was sort of one on 20, I think? One of these heroes, and I’m sure there’s many, after hearing all the stories yesterday and talking to parents today, from people that lost a son in the first day of fighting, there’s a lot of heroes out there that aren’t alive to tell their stories in terms of what the people did, but pretty remarkable that he was able to fight his way through them. He was able to take an automatic weapon off of a fallen soldier and keep fighting and then some others arrived and fought the whole day. But it was just really, really incredible, and I’m sure helped save a lot of lives. And then I met at the [Nova music festival] concert area with a young policeman who was going to work that Saturday. He arrives at work at the concert at 6:22 on Saturday morning [on Oct. 7] to start a shift as a security guard for the concert. And he looked up on the horizon and sees 300 armed people coming, surrounding the camp and starting shooting civilians. He was involved in a number of battles. He ended up commandeering a civilian vehicle and throughout the day, kept ferrying trips back and forth. … His wife was begging him to come home after he successfully got out of there. And he’s like, ‘No, I’ve got to go back.’ And by the end of the day, he had transported over 200 people, sometimes as many as a dozen or 15 in a little sedan in the trunk and the back seat, piled on top of each other, as many as he could get out of there. 

So, just heroic, heroic stories in the face of all this tragedy. And I think you add it all up, and it really tells a story about the people of Israel, and their determination in the face of unthinkable, unthinkable evil and these atrocities that were happening down there. It was inspiring to see young people fighting for their country, and fighting for their friends and fighting for their families, as opposed to protesting their country on campus. 

JI: Now, this is your first trip to Israel, right?

DB: The first time as a governor. I was here a long time ago, right after graduate school, but I was just here hitting every historical site. As you can imagine, as part of that trip, [I was] soaking it all in.

JI: The differences between then and now must be so vast.

DB: It is because, back then, there was a lot of history that hadn’t passed. But it was not that long, within two decades of the ‘67 war, and so it was coming off of that era. But this country’s grown. The GDP has grown. The whole tech sector has grown. I did have a chance to meet with tech leaders yesterday at Startup Nation Central. And, of course, there’s folks focused on next generation agriculture. And I know that one of the challenges post-Oct. 7 that we learned about was the labor requirements for some of the agricultural work that was being done by either folks from Gaza or people from Thailand. We’ve got a big effort going on in North Dakota about automation and agriculture, which is happening, of course, at the tractor and combine level, but there’s a lot of other things that can happen that could make agriculture more productive, less labor intensive, and that are pretty exciting in terms of how we can do that. I’m certain from that meeting, many Israeli companies may be traveling to North Dakota to talk about potential opportunities there. I spent most of my career in the tech industry, so it was exciting to see that. And then, from a strategic standpoint, speaking as a governor, I can’t think of a more important ally than Israel, and really highlighted this week with the precision of the countermeasures on the pagers and all of that stuff, is some really impressive and skilled work, but it’s one of the reasons, when we think about the threats in the world ahead of us, the skills around technology and cyber and counter-cyber and all that, and obviously, Israel’s got some great skills in that area. They’ve got the ability to project power, and actually the will that makes it, in my regard, certainly our most important ally in this part of the world. 

JI: What has been the tenor and tone of the meetings that you’ve had?

DB: I think one thing is clear, is the determination, and in that sense, of course, I’m of the point of view that the United States, if we’re really an ally, that we should be putting demands and conditions on Hamas or Hezbollah or Iran, or any part of their terror network. And right now, I think it’s understood that I’m campaigning hard on the Republican side because I feel an administration that would be putting conditions on our adversaries and the terrorist organizations, as opposed to putting conditions on Israel, because I feel like every time Vice President Harris calls for a cease-fire or withholds weapons, that just gives hope to Hamas and extends the timeframe when we ever might have hostages released or actually finish the job that was started here to remove the terrorism threat from the border.

JI: Does that mean you think that the cease-fire negotiations are a bit misguided?

DB: I think whenever you’re in conflict, it’s always good to be talking, but we shouldn’t be putting demands on Israel. We meaning the United States. In my view, we should be putting demands on the folks that can actually do things, like release the hostages or create a cease-fire. I think we’ve got it backwards. And I have said before. I feel like sometimes Biden/Harris, they have been negotiating for the terrorists. We used to say we don’t negotiate with terrorists. They clearly have been doing that, starting with the Iran nuclear deal. But going through the $6 billion for five hostages that were being held by Iran [last year], the unfreezing of $10 billion more of assets, the failed oil sanctions, which have enriched the entire Iranian regime [and] allowed them to finance every other side of the seven-front war that Israel’s in right now. So I just feel like we’ve got it all wrong. And U.S. energy policy is part of the problem, because the current policy hurts American energy and helps Russia, helps Iran. And, of course, they’ve upped their production, that’s helping China. I mean, we turned Russia and Iran into China’s discount gas station at a time when we’re raising prices of energy production back at home in the United States. So I feel like we’re backwards 180 degrees, going the wrong direction on how we should be pulling a maximum pressure on Iran and among us and the Houthis and Hezbollah, as opposed to the other way around, or I said, putting conditions on Israel.

JI: What have you learned here that you think North Dakota could learn from Israel? And conversely, what Israel can learn from North Dakota?

DB: Well, I think one thing I would say is not just North Dakota, but the country, [could learn] when you’ve got the level of broad commitment to military service. I was at a lunch today, and I was with a dad of seven kids. His oldest — 22 years old — was stationed down near the border with Gaza. And the fighting started, and he fought the whole day and then made it back to his base safely at about five o’clock. But then a rocket came into the base and he was killed. The father gave me a photo that he had taken and it’s time-stamped. And it’s Oct. 7, and it’s about 9:30 in the morning. So they’ve been fighting for two-and-a-half, three hours, and it’s a group selfie, [the type] a group of young, college-age kids would take of themselves, and they’ve got smiles on their faces. And his folks that he was leading, all said that after that photo he gave him inspirational words about how they had an opportunity and the honor to be able to fight for their country, to fight for freedom, fight for democracy. And I think that’s just incredibly, incredibly inspiring, again, in the face of the evil and the atrocities to have people that have an understanding of history and an understanding of the importance of the fight that’s going on right now.

JI: You’ve got three kids. What was it like as a parent to sit with these parents today?

DB: Well, I think it’s heart-wrenching, because I think any parent, the joys of parenting are great, but I think the greatest fear that any parent has is losing a child and having met another father at lunch today, whose son is one of the hostages, and they haven’t had any confirmation of life since March, but they’re praying and they’re hoping.

JI: How has, or has this trip at all changed your approach to foreign policy?

DB: Well, I think it’s been more of a confirmation. Hearing stories on the ground about some of the things that are happening right now where the U.S. is applying sanctions on individual Israelis. The hypocrisy seems incredible, and that kind of left-leaning approach to lawfare, which we know is being applied at home in our own country, against political enemies. But the activity with international criminal courts, the U.N., UNRWA funding. I mean, if you take a look at all these international organizations that essentially have developed and funded many anti-Israeli programs, which, again, are helping the terrorists. It was sort of renewing, for me, the importance of U.S. leadership, that we don’t have our adversaries using under the brand of supposedly neutral global organizations really acting on behalf of our adversaries in coordinated and strategic ways. I mean, is sort of this international lawfare, as opposed to the kind of lawfare we’re seeing at home. And I just heard example after example from people about that which was very, very helpful. I was in the private sector for most of my career. And I think one of the reasons we had success was we weren’t afraid to get out of the office and go talk to customers in their businesses, in their factories, in their places around the world. We had customers in over 100 countries, and so to get here and basically get ground truth from people who are directly involved in it.

One of the folks I met at the kibbutz Nir Oz, he was giving us a tour, and he was going through with great empathy about all these other folks. And then just quietly at the end, and he’s like, ‘Oh, this is my parents’ house, and they were both kidnapped.’ They were both kidnapped and taken hostage, and his mother was released. And then his father was 80 years old, was executed this summer, and he had other relatives who’d lost the … the mom, the dad, the three kids all dying in a safe room, and [our guide and his wife were] less than what would be a city block away in their house with their three kids. And just because of the holiday weekend, [our guide] had a niece staying with them. And so there were four children in this thing, and there was no way to lock the door from the inside. So he and his wife put pressure on and put belts around, and they basically sit guard at the door for hours and hours. They had terrorists in their house, using their house as a refreshment place for four-and-a-half or five hours, from like 10 in the morning until three in the afternoon. And he was one of the leaders. so he’s trying to hold the door and respond to other people and watching neighbors’ homes go up in flames. It’s just horrifying to think of. But he was still thinking about his neighbors and thinking about his family, and he and his wife had the strength to make it through all that. And he’s down there now farming and trying to rebuild that community. 

I mean, the resilience and the perseverance. Like I said, out of all these tragedies, there’s so many heroes and so many inspirational stories. And I think, for one thing, I will take back home as we approach the anniversary of Oct. 7, I think one of the ways that the U.S. was healing [after 9/11] was there was so much attention put on the first responders, the firemen and the police that came after the attacks, many who lost their lives. And there’s parallel stories here, and I’m hoping that the global media and the U.S. press can really grab onto and understand the heroism that reflects back on this country that happened on that day, and the strength back now. 

[The pager and walkie-talkie attack was] the widest, broadest, most effective disruption of a terror organization, perhaps in history, with a 1% lethality rate. This is unheard of on so many different levels in terms of being able to cause a disruption with so few deaths, but to really disrupt an organization and undermine their trust and how they communicate with each other. And I think again, in what’s happening in Gaza and southern Gaza [in Rafah], where we had Vice President Harris and others saying, ‘Oh, don’t go in there. There’s going to be all these casualties.’ And then they go in there, and then in the numbers that are being shared with us, official numbers yesterday. It’s so impressive again, that they’re being able to safely move a population of 1.4 million people out of the way while finishing the job of taking out the terrorist organization that rained all this evil on this country. There’s a lot, I think, in terms of telling the story. And I think it’s important to continue to make sure that in winning the war, we’ve got to make sure that we also can be winning the war of public opinion, because there’s so many things that can be framed both as good and evil, and they’re framed in terms of just the individual integrity and ethical approach to how Israel is pushing back against all of this. I certainly expect to continue to do my part to help make sure that America understands the important role that Israel is playing and fighting for democracies all over the world.