Is Biden going to be willing to go "Dark Brandon" on Netanyahu?
"Famine is imminent" in Gaza, says Delaware Sen. Chris Van Hollen, calling it a "textbook war crime. And that makes those who orchestrate it war criminals." (See video at the end of this post.)
If you aren’t reading Laura Rozen’s reporting on the current Middle East situation, today would be a good day to start. Solid coverage of foreign affairs issues facing the US is always valuable. She reports on the latest Biden Administration claims of diplomatic pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s government to back off on the war:
President Biden in a call with the Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu on Sunday stressed the need to “capitalize on progress” in recent negotiations for the release of the remaining over 100 hostages held by Hamas, in a seemingly broader White House effort to subtly push back on recent posturing by Netanyahu. …
A U.S. senior administration official, somewhat unusually, backgrounded some reporters on the call shortly after it occurred, in what also may be part of an unacknowledged White House effort to gently push back a bit on the Israeli Prime Minister’s office sometimes seeming to try to spin their communications to his political benefit at home. The U.S. administration official emphasized that getting the release of all the remaining hostages is President Biden and the White House’s top priority. Wholly unspoken was the sense perhaps that it is not always clear in practice that it is Netanyahu’s top priority.
“I’d say about two thirds of the call really focused on a hostage deal,” the senior administration official said. “This has been really a primary focus on the President’s over the last month.”1 [my emphasis]
Noura Erakat of Rutgers University stresses that action to restrain Netanyahu’s war on the people of Gaza is urgent, and until that happens, public warnings or leaked expressions of concern by American officials are just hot air.2 (She puts it more professionally. But also more emphatically.)
Rozen’s report reminds us that the fog of war also produces foggy public diplomacy:
U.S. officials have suggested they do not believe that Israel intends to launch a major military operation on Rafah imminently, and that if one were to occur, it may be weeks away.
A European official, speaking not for attribution, suggested that the messages his government was getting from Israeli officials a few weeks ago suggested they were not planning to do a major military on Rafah.
It is not clear if western officials are suggesting that Israel’s plans have changed, or that the Israeli talk of a military operation on Rafah is meant to be a kind of psychological pressure on Hamas.
“I will say, we have heard form Israeli leaders and security officials that there’s a clear precondition for any [military operation] in Rafah that the population would have…to be moved safely…and again, how that’s done,…that is a huge question,” the U.S. official said. [my emphasis]
There are policy differences between the Biden Administration and the Netanyahu government. So it’s not surprising that the respective public narratives are confusing.
Alon Pinkas foresees a good possibility that Biden is getting ready to go into Dark Brandon mode on Netanyahu. He hasn't yet, so far as we can see publicly, even though Netanyahu treats Biden and the US with open contempt even as we supply their war on Gaza civilians with no significant restraints publicly visible so far.
Right now, Biden is fully aware that his Israel policy, however justified he feels it was, is causing him tangible political damage not just among Arab Americans in Michigan, but across a large segment of young 18- to 40-year-old voters appalled by the war. According to a recent poll, 50 percent of them believe Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. …
The New York Times reported Friday that "in a closed-door meeting with Arab American leaders in Michigan this week, one of President Biden's top foreign policy aides [Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer] acknowledged mistakes in the administration's response to the war in Gaza, saying he did not have 'any confidence' that Israel's government was willing to take 'meaningful steps' toward Palestinian statehood." …
This should not come as news to Biden. It seems that until now, his visceral, genuine love of Israel outweighed his visceral, genuine disdain for Netanyahu. But the prime minister's ungratefulness for Biden's robust support, his disregard for U.S. interests, and his intransigence to engage the United States in talks about postwar Gaza and regional restructuring, may have tipped the balance.
An angry Biden is a dangerous Biden, which is something Netanyahu should know.3 [my emphasis]
The anger will only be meaningful when Biden cuts off military aid (or drastically reduces it). Otherwise, Netanyahu and his government will continue to treat him with open contempt. Netanyahu has strong reasons of his own for keeping the war going - i.e., staying in office and out of jail - and for getting the even more pliant Donald Trump back in the White House. And the longer US aid to Israel’s current war continues, the more it increases the chances that Trump will be back in charge.
Haaretz gives another example of the White House talking the talk - or at least making a show of doing so - without the only condition that appears to be meaningful to Netanyahu and his government: actually cutting military aid:
U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Monday that the United States "does not support any military campaign in Rafah" as long as Israel "can't properly account for about 1.1 million people who are there today."
Miller added that the Biden administration is looking forward to reviewing the details of the planned military operation with the Israeli counterparts.4
While Tony Blinken’s State Department was giving that additional blank-check commitment (“looking forward to reviewing the details”), the EU’s foreign affairs High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy was at least being blunt about the only thing that would work with Netanyahu’s far-right government:
Earlier, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called for the U.S. to rethink its military aid to Israel due to the high number of civilian casualties in the war in Gaza.
Borrell recalled that Biden said last week that Israel's response to the Oct. 7 Hamas attack had been "over the top" and U.S. officials had repeatedly said that too many civilians were being killed in Gaza.
"Well, if you believe that too many people are being killed, maybe you should provide fewer arms in order to prevent so many people being killed," Borrell told reporters after a meeting of EU development aid ministers in Brussels.
"If the international community believes that this is a slaughter, that too many people are being killed, maybe we have to think about the provision of arms," he added. [my emphasis]
As public diplomatic statements go, that’s about as close as you are likely to hear a senior EU official publicly saying to a US President that the whole world can see that the Israeli Prime Minister is playing him for a fool. And the National Security Council flack John Kirby basically said, yes, play us for fools:
"We don't want to see any forced relocation of people outside Gaza," Kirby stressed. "Gaza is home to those folks, and they shouldn't be forced to leave if they don't want to leave. If there's going to be [a military] operation in or around Rafah, Israelis have an obligation to make sure they can provide for the safety of innocent Palestinians that are there."
Comments about how “Israelis have an obligation“ without backing it up with actual major cuts in US military aid are just a bad joke.
It’s also nice that Biden is saying, “The US is working on a hostage deal between Israel and Hamas which would bring an immediate and sustained period of calm to Gaza for at least six weeks [during] which we could take the time to build something more enduring.”5
But unless the US actually cuts the military aid to Israel, a six-week “period of calm” coupled with the release of all Israeli hostages will just be taken by Netanyahu’s government that the US will back a new ethnic cleansing campaign in Gaza whenever they decide to do it.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said any Israeli ground offensive on Rafah would have “disastrous consequences,” and asserted that Israel aims to eventually force the Palestinians out of their land. Egypt has warned that any movement of Palestinians into Egypt would threaten the four-decade-old peace treaty between Israel and Egypt.6
Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen from Maryland calls out Netanyahu’s obvious contempt for the position of the US, its most important ally and weapons supplier7:
"Famine is imminent" in Gaza, he says, also calling it a "textbook war crime. And that makes those who orchestrate it war criminals."
Rozen, Laura (2024): Biden urges Israel PM to “capitalize on progress” in hostage release talks, pushing back on Netanyahu posturing. Diplomatic 02/12/2024. <https://diplomatic.substack.com/p/biden-urges-israel-to-capitalize> (Accessed: 2024-12-02).
Noura Erakat: Israel’s Looming Invasion of Rafah is the “Worst-Case Scenario”. Democracy Now! YouTube channel 02/12/2024. (Accessed: 2024-12-02).
Pinkas, Alon (2024): Biden Had a Week to Forget, but There's Something Netanyahu Should Remember About Him. Haaretz 02/11/2024. <https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/2024-02-11/ty-article/.premium/biden-had-a-week-to-forget-but-theres-something-netanyahu-should-remember-about-him/0000018d-98f5-dc01-a9cf-9afd98ef0000> (Accessed: 2024-13-02).
Samuels, Ben, et. al. (2024): U.S. Opposes Israeli Rafah Raid Without Plan for Displaced Gazans; EU Chief Diplomat Urges Aid Cut. Haaretz 02/11/2024. <https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-02-12/ty-article/u-s-opposes-rafah-raid-without-plan-for-displaced-gazans-eu-chief-diplomat-urges-aid-cut/0000018d-9ef4-d747-a78f-fefcefdd0000> (Accessed: 13-02-2024).
Lazaroff, Tovah (2024): Biden says US working on Gaza hostage deal that would lead to six-week period of calm. Jerusalem Post 02/12/2024. <https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/article-786617> (Accessed: 13-02-2024).
Jobbain, Najib et. al. (2024): Arab states warn Israel against launching invasion of Rafah. Christian Science Monitor 02/10/2024. <https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2024/0210/Arab-states-warn-Israel-against-launching-invasion-of-Rafah> (Accessed: 13-02-2024).
Dem Senator Slams Netanyahu's Actions In Rafah: 'Thumbs His Nose At America's Legitimate Requests'. Forbes Breaking News YouTube channel 02/13/2024. (Accessed: 13-02-2024).