President Joe Biden addresses community leaders and first responders following the recent terrorist attacks by Hamas, Wednesday, October 18, 2023, at the Hotel Kempinski in Tel Aviv, Israel. (Official White House Photo by Cameron Smith)
President Biden’s inconsistent handling of the Israel-Hamas conflict is straining relations with Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu, the US’s primary ally in the Middle East. At the same time, the uncoordinated and conflicting policy decisions make the US appear weak, encouraging terrorists and adversaries in the region and around the globe. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) criticized Biden, stating, “President Biden has continued to embolden Iran through weak policies, allowing Iran to fund terrorist attacks against our allies.” Initially, the President pledged his support for Israel, but then later announced that he would pause the delivery of some US weapons and ammunition to Israel. Now, it seems that Biden is moving forward with a $1 billion arms sale to Israel.
President Biden said that he is frustrated with Netanyahu’s handling of the conflict, saying that too many civilians have died. He criticizes the Prime Minister for not using targeted enough attacks, thus resulting in more civilian casualties. On the other hand, according to Senator JD Vance (R-OH), Biden is withholding advanced US weapons which could be used to target more directly against Hamas, reducing civilian casualties.
A good example is Israel’s ability to conduct targeted attacks, such as the strike against a senior commander in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, whom Israel assassinated in Syria last month. Not only were civilian casualties kept to a minimum, but several of his assistants, including another general, were also killed, dealing a significant blow to Iran’s ability to fight in the region.
There have been no serious demands from the White House for the hostages to be released, including the Americans. However, the president is on TV condemning Netanyahu’s actions in Gaza. Providing a view from outside of the United States, former senior British military intelligence officer Philip Ingram suggests that Hamas is watching and most likely feels that all they have to do is wait. Eventually, the support from the US and the world will wane, and Hamas will survive.
And if Hamas survives, the attacks will continue. Hamas leaders have publicly stated that they plan to commit future attacks similar to October 7th. Mr. Ingram has gone so far as to call Biden and the pro-Palestine protestors “useful idiots” because they are applying pro-Hamas pressure on Western governments without Hamas having to do anything.
Defenders of President Biden’s policies say that he is working from a position of lessons the US allegedly learned in Vietnam and Afghanistan. However, if the US had actually learned from Vietnam, the US would never have had to face the same situation in Afghanistan. In fact, if the US had learned from the French in Vietnam, the US would never have had to learn their own lessons from Vietnam. Given the US track record in the Middle East, it is illogical for President Biden to “micromanage” Israel’s war.
After the US let down the Afghanis and the Kurds, and now that there are widespread pro-Hamas and anti-American protests sweeping US college campuses, Netanyahu must be questioning President Biden’s commitment to US national security, much less Israel’s. A country so riddled with security threats, including open borders which are allowing terrorists, transnational crime, and narcotrafficking organizations to operate within the US, has no place telling Israel how to handle its own national security.
Netanyahu has his goals and objectives, and his strategy seems to be working. As of December, Israel claimed they were at the halfway mark in the war, and the IDF continues to make gains against the terrorists. Hamas began the war by killing 1,200 unarmed civilians. Now that they are being defeated, they are trying to tap out, to get the world community to come in and stop Israel. At the same time, Hamas is literally and figuratively hiding behind its own civilian population. Hamas does not wear uniforms, so even when Israel kills Hamas terrorists, the organization can claim that Israel is targeting civilians. Therefore, while it is unfortunate that innocent people are being killed, they were put in harm’s way by Hamas; consequently, defeating Hamas will sadly result in collateral damage.
The only way for peace is to defeat Hamas as a military organization. There is no way to defeat or eliminate the ideology, but by rooting out the commanders and military-trained battalions, Israel will be in a much better position. At the end of the day, the reason why Egypt and other Arab nations will not accept the refugees is that they also fear and hate Hamas. Saudi Arabia, in particular, is just concerned about making money. They have no time for terrorists. Consequently, if Israel is allowed to finish the job, decimating Hamas’s ability to wage war, the offensive will stop, the images and videos will fade from headlines, and the Israel-Gaza offensive will fade into the memory hole. At that point, it will be much easier for Israel and Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and other regional powers to normalize relations, creating an anti-Iran coalition and bringing greater stability to the region.
Senator Vance put it this way, “Our goal in the Middle East should be to allow the Israelis to get to some good place with the Saudi Arabians and other Gulf Arab states. There is no way that we can do that unless the Israelis finish the job with Hamas.”
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