“Joe Biden’s threat last week to freeze arms shipments to Israel along with reports that his administration is withholding intelligence about Hamas leaders’ whereabouts has reverberated throughout U.S. politics. Now, some Never Trump donors say the Biden administration’s policy toward the Jewish state is such a betrayal they’re considering jumping on board the Trump train.
“Call it the rise of the Never Bidens, donors who once were more worried about Trump but now see Joe Biden’s bid for a second term as the greater threat to America. The Free Press spoke with four donors who contributed tens of millions of dollars in the last election cycle. They say they are reconsidering their political giving in light of the president’s approach to the Israel-Hamas war. All of them expressed their frustration with Biden’s CNN interview last Wednesday, in which he said of Israel, ‘if they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah.’”
Mr. Lake goes on to quote a wealthy Republican donor who formerly gave seven figures to Nikki Haley in her primary battles with former President Donald Trump. President Biden’s Israel policies were enough to make him overlook his long distaste for President Trump and begin supporting the past president.
How much of this is a trend is not clear yet, but it is unfortunately clear that the administration’s policy toward the Gaza War seems more confused than ever, except to the extent that it seems driven more than anything by votes in Michigan.
With polls now reporting substantial leads for President Trump in most swing states, these policy vacillations have only increased.
On the question of weapons for Israel, it’s beginning to resemble the old song, “First you say you do and then you don’t.” It’s enough to create whiplash at the minimum. It also gives hope to Hamas and arguably prolongs the war.
At play in this is also the continuing unrest on our campuses. President Biden likely considers academia and its various components and off-shoots important parts of his constituency that he does not wish to offend. But in doing so, the administration has to ignore who is instigating these protests to a significant, and ultimately not surprising, degree.
The administration, via Secretary of State Antony Blinken, has also inferred they have several options of their own about how to make certain Hamas never has control of Gaza again and is therefore never in a position to invade Israel again, but they have as yet to make these plans clear, at least to the public. If they indeed have any, it’s probably about time they should.
Moreover, although more skillful than White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, White House National Security Communications Adviser John Kirby, the point man on Middle East issues, has also not been particularly helpful in clarifying this ever-changing policy.
“A day after the massacre, before Israel’s campaign against Hamas even began, Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrote that he was encouraging the Turkish government’s ‘advocacy for a cease-fire.’ It makes no difference that the tweet has since been deleted, since the White House has produced no shortage of evidence since that its top priority is to deter Israel from defeating Hamas, by increasing Israel’s vulnerabilities at every turn, and conditioning aid on Israel adopting a purely defensive posture.”
In his lengthy piece, Mr. Smith, who identifies President Biden’s policies as essentially dictated by those of former President Barack Obama, comes to a particularly grim conclusion about what’s behind our country’s behavior:
“It’s not the traditional U.S.-led order in the Middle East that the revisionist faction, Obama’s faction, is most determined to dismantle but rather the existing order in the U.S. And it’s not Israel that it’s most keen to grind into dust, but America. For the party that Obama remade in his image to triumph at home, the Palestinians must win.”
I am obviously giving short shrift to the full extent of Mr. Smith’s argument, but is he correct? Is an anti-American, anti-constitutional republic policy buried deeply behind America’s erratic policy vis-a-vis the Israel-Gaza War?
Now that debates between President Biden and President Trump have been announced (with some reservations), President Biden will have an opportunity to explain his position, to clarify his policy, even in the unlikely event that the war has ended before the first June date.
This would take, however, debates that were better managed than we have had before with moderators who were genuinely unbiased and/or not thinking first of their own reputations. The sad truth, based on past experience, is that is also unlikely.
But that doesn’t stop the rest of us, including the redoubtable Mr. Lake, from drawing our own conclusions. They are becoming increasingly clear.
