Seven months ago, almost to the day, Hamas and the Gazans launched a barbaric attack on Israeli civilians, slaughtering more Jews in any single day since the Holocaust. The recognizing government of the enclave raped, pillaged, and slaughtered Israelis and foreigners at a music festival, on the kibbutzes that feed Israel, and kidnapped around 250 men, women, and children as hostages. Gazans cheered the return of these barbaric hordes, and Hamas pledged to keep conducting warfare of this nature until they destroyed Israel and enslaved its inhabitants.
And it is the terrorists with whom Joe Biden apparently wants to side. Angry that Israel wishes to win the war that Hamas and the Gazans started, Biden announced that he would withhold weapons from Israel until they stop trying to attack Hamas where they have hidden themselves — in Rafah. For some reason, Biden sets a larger store on the survival of Hamas than of the American ally that Hamas pledges to destroy:
Mr. Biden hopes the selective pause will prompt Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel to forgo a long-threatened invasion of Rafah, the southern Gaza city where more than one million Palestinians have taken refuge. The president has objected to such an operation out of fear that widespread civilian casualties could be caused by American bombs. He said on Wednesday that he would also block the delivery of artillery shells that could be fired into the urban neighborhoods of Rafah.
“I’ve made it clear to Bibi and the war cabinet, they’re not going to get our support if in fact they go on these population centers,” the president said in an interview with CNN’s Erin Burnett on Wednesday, referring to Mr. Netanyahu by his nickname. “We’re not walking away from Israel’s security; we’re walking away from Israel’s ability to wage war in those areas.”
Biden added that Israel’s operations are “killing civilians”:
He acknowledged in a way that he has rarely done that American bombs have killed innocent Palestinians. “Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs and other ways in which they go after population centers,” Mr. Biden said.
Yes, and … ? Name one war operation against brigade-size enemy forces conducted by the US that didn’t generate civilian deaths. (Don’t look in Iraq or Syria!) This is why the Gazans and their elected (and popular!) government should not have started a war. But this is an even more malicious and intellectually dishonest argument, because Hamas deliberately stages its operations in civilian areas to prevent Israel from fighting back. That in itself is a war crime, which puts responsibility for those deaths on Hamas. By making this argument, Biden is endorsing Hamas’ war crimes and enabling its tactical and strategic terror operations, essentially arguing that Hamas is untouchable because it uses human shields.
Is that the act of an ally? Or someone who wants to let an ally get defeated by terrorism?
At least Biden acknowledges that Israel is in a war. Hamas has waged war continuously since taking power in Gaza in 2007, firing a never-ending volley of missiles and rockets at Israeli civilian centers, even during supposed cease-fires. The US routinely brokers these cease-fire agreements only to see Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad routinely violate them to re-start the hot war they and the Gazans desire.
The US, especially in the Obama and Biden years, chose to treat Hamas as the legitimate representative government of the Gazans, rather than the terrorists they are. They continued to negotiate with Hamas for a two-state solution Hamas refuses to accept under any circumstances, mainly for the domestic political benefit of Barack Obama and Joe Biden. And even after Hamas demonstrated their barbaric and monstrous nature on October 7 far past the point of any denial as to their evil nature, Biden still cares more about preserving Hamas for his two-state-solution fantasy than he does the liberal democracy Hamas seeks to destroy and replace with yet another brutal Islamist dictatorship.
And Biden has done all this without any pressure on Hamas to return hostages. Indeed, the US proposals during the negotiation with terrorists — another Obama-Biden change to US foreign policy — have put all of the onus on Israel to make concessions. The US tried to leverage Hamas’ shabby propaganda ploy this week on a hostage ‘deal’ to accept terms that would leave Hamas in place, still holding most of the hostages and releasing hundreds if not thousands of its operatives into the West Bank.
Don’t think people in Israel have missed Biden’s priorities.
Hamas ❤️Biden
— איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) May 9, 2024
That’s from the Israeli nat-sec minister Itamar Ben Gvir. Other officials pledged that this would only strengthen their resolve and perhaps even prompt them to escalate attacks on Rafah in order to settle the issue quickly:
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich stated bluntly that the strong American opposition would only reinvigorate Israel’s drive to eliminate Hamas.
“We must continue this war until victory, despite, and to a certain extent precisely because of, the opposition of the administration Biden and the stopping of arms shipments,” he said in a statement. “We simply have no other choice that does not endanger our existence and security.” …
In New York, UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan called Biden’s remarks “difficult and very disappointing,” and expressed concern that they would be interpreted by Israel’s foes Iran, Hamas, and Hezbollah as “something that gives them hope to succeed.”
It’s not just in Israel where Biden’s shocking betrayal will have an impact. My friend Jonah Goldberg from the Dispatch has his finger on the pulse of the never-Trumpers, and he senses a sea change:
Fwiw. I’ve heard from a LOT of reliably anti-Trump people – I mean really, really, anti-Trump people – who have had it with Biden tonight. Anecdotal, to be sure. But very telling in my circle.
— Jonah Goldberg (@JonahDispatch) May 9, 2024
It sounds like they may agree with Donald Trump, who accused “Crooked Joe Biden” of siding with terrorists over an American ally, even while the terrorists continue to hold American citizens hostage:
Trump is given to hyperbole, but not in this instance. Biden really has taken the side of the terrorists.
Jewish Insider reported last night that it’s not just Trump and Republicans who are aghast at this move from Biden. He’s losing Democrats in Congress, and Jewish groups that tend to support them:
President Joe Biden’s CNN interview threatening to cut off offensive weapons transfers to Israel if Israel invades Rafah drew quick criticism from Israel-backing Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill, and from mainstream Jewish and pro-Israel organizations across the country. …
Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) told Jewish Insider before Biden’s interview, addressing previously disclosed moves by the administration to pause certain arms sales, that Hamas has little incentive to agree to a hostage deal.
“The hope by now is that we would have gotten to a ceasefire and the Rafah operation would not have been necessary in exchange for at least some hostages. But the problem is there’s no pressure on Hamas,” Moskowitz said. “If Hamas is watching American television, which I guarantee you they are, they’re seeing more division and their power growing in this country, which means less pressure on Hamas… The only pressure that is left is the military pressure.”
Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) allowed that Biden may be sending a message, but not the one Biden thinks he’s sending. Plus, if Biden’s really worried about civilian casualties in Rafah …
Sherman said he found the administration’s delays in sending the guided munitions and guided munitions kits, known as JDAMs, particularly concerning.
“How in the hell do you criticize Israel for being imprecise in its bombing and then refuse to deliver them what they’re willing to pay for to make the bombs precise?” Sherman said. “I mean, my god.”
Like every other Biden policy decision, it’s comprehensively bad. It expresses incoherence, disloyalty, cravenness, and abject submission to America’s enemies. It will backfire in any number of ways, but the very first result will be that Israel will really take the gloves off in Rafah now, and not just with the use of ‘dumber’ bombs. The war cabinet laid out intricate plans that put IDF troops at far greater risk to satisfy American demands on civilian protection. The IDF is routinely far better at that than any fighting force, even the US, but they jumped through those hoops to help Biden look as though he was accomplishing something with Israel. They have zero incentive to kiss his ass now, which means that Biden just lost any influence on Israel’s war plans for the duration of this conflict.
It’s an utter disgrace. Biden backstabbed the Afghan government we helped build as a bulwark against the Taliban and abandoned 14,000 American citizens and legal permanent residents to the terrorists in Afghanistan in his haste to vindicate himself. This time, Biden wants to abandon American hostages and nine million Israelis to Hamas in order to appease Iran. Biden stabs his allies in the back while kneeling before his enemies. And Hamas and Iran won’t be the only people who notice that.