By: Jonathan Feldstein
Its almost unimaginable to see recent Biden Administration moves going from bad to worse, so much so that these defer any prospect for any real peace or an end to the war against Hamas (and Iran and its proxies).
It’s known that President Biden overcame a problem with stuttering decades ago. The problem is while he is not stuttering, his mindless repetition of hollow words simply embolden the terrorists. Repeating “Don’t,” to Iran before launching an unprecedented attack on Israel, without consequences, and telling Israel to “take the win” and not respond forcefully is moronic. Repeating that his support for Israel is “ironclad,” but then showing the world in general, US allies, and specifically the terrorists that it is not, simply emboldens the terrorists and makes them less likely to release the hostages, or negotiate in any good faith.
Last week, President Biden went public with his threat to cut off weapons delivery to Israel, suggesting that Israel was using them illegally or irresponsibly, despite his own administration verifying that wasn’t the case.
The first problem with this is that he went public. Not even his mentor Obama did that when he cut off delivery of the precision Hellfire missile. Cutting off weapons is bad enough. Announcing to the terrorists that he’s doing so across international media simply empowers them.
Specifically, by doing so, Biden gave Hamas abundant reason to refuse any deal to release the hostages, including Americans, that it is holding in Gaza for over seven months. After this happened, I created a meme, “Dear Bresident Biden, shukran. Hamas.” Hamas is jubilant.
Now, with no hostage deal even possible because of Biden emboldening Hamas after his own Secretery of State said that the deal before Hamas was very generous, Israel must complete its invasion of Rafah to find and release the hostages and crush the remains of Hamas’ 4-5 battalions.
By cutting off precision munitions, Biden is ensuring that more civilians will die, which was the premise that he used to cutoff the weapons. Yes, read that again. Dead Gazans blood will be on Biden’s hands.
Biden’s action also emboldens Hezbollah in Lebanon, making an all-out war there more likely, not less so.
Jordan, Egypt and other “moderate” Arab allies are watching the blunder unfold with multiple negative consequences. First, it tells them that the US is not a reliable ally, and if it will turn its back on Israel, it can and will do so to them. This may make them even more extremist. Biden’s blunder also pushes off any possible Saudi normalization for the same reason. The Saudis don’t need to extend themselves if they don’t believe the US is going to be a reliable partner.
All this sends multiple dangerous messages to Iran and its terrorist proxies, basically that they can get away with their murderous terrorist objectives, without consequence. They have a free pass to operate against Israeli and soft Jewish targets, US targets, and the Arab and western world.
By pushing off the necessary ground operation in Rafah because of US pressure, it means there will be even more Israeli casualties, and a call by many to finish off Hamas because otherwise the nearly 300 soldiers killed since the war began will have died in vain.
Look for Russia and China to swoop in to extend their negative influence in the region, and anywhere else they see US policies as being weak.
A few weeks ago, the US passed a bill providing an additional $17 billion for Israel to have the weapons needed to fight the war. Now the US is tying Israel’s hands from doing so which means more casualties, not less. I was asked about this in an interview, and said that I was thankful as an Israeli but proud as an American, for the US making the right choice.
Then I commented that had Biden alone not released $6 billion to Iran in the summer, and then another $10 billion to Iran in the winter, ($16 billion), and Obama paying off the Iranians with billions more, perhaps the war would not have happened and there would be no deaths, no emboldening the Iranians, no funding for their proxies, and no need for an extra $17 billion. Just think, what if the US were to engage in a full scall embargo on Iran, cutting the Islamic regime off from any possible funds, bringing the already weak Iranian economy to its knees, and empowering Iranians to take back their country from the Ayatollahs. There could have been regime change in Iran without a US weapon being fired, a safer world, and no war now.
It gets worse. After declaring that he is withholding weapons, ostensibly to avoid civilian deaths in Rafah, there have been reports of the Biden Administration offering Israel a deal: providing intelligence on the location of Hamas terror leaders in exchange for Israel not conducting an all out assault. It’s unthinkable that if the US had such intelligence it would not provide that not as a carrot on the end of a stick, but to help Israel defeat Hamas which the US has acknowledged is an important goal. Had this happened days or weeks ago, Israel could have cut off the head of the Hamas snake already, saving lives on both sides. If these reports are true, there’s all the more blood in Gaza on the hands of the US administration.
And as the US tries to link Saudi recognition of Israel with a US-Saudi defense treaty, the Saudis surely are looking at this all and thinking that any such agreement with the Biden Administration is as valuable as the paper it’s written on, an they would be better off waiting until after November 5 anyway.
The war against Hamas and other Iranian proxies must be to defeat them, not to appease them and certainly not to leave them standing where they can threaten either Israel or continue to occupy more than two million Gazans, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and elsewhere. Biden would be well served to understand this, recognizing that the only way to defeat the Hamas wing of the Democratic Party to which he is shamefully pandering is to truly defeat them.
For him and the Democratic Party, the issue is no less existential. Despite making enormous mistakes akin to a multi-system diplomatic failure, Biden still refers to himself as a Zionist and supporter of Israel. If he allows the Ilhan Omars, Rashida Tlaibs and other Hamas supporters in his own party to win, he may be the last Democratic president who publicly claims support for Israel.
Biden has already lost Michigan and other states. Short of declaring war on Israel, it’s a done deal. Many pundits believe that his appeasement of the Hamas wing of his own party will not only not work come November 5, but is immoral.
What Biden is doing now is extending the war, preventing the completion of the necessary objectives, and creating more casualties. Is there a conspiracy behind it, or just plain stupidity?
What happens in Gaza doesn’t stay in Gaza. If only Biden understood the negative consequences of his policies are vast.