Exploiting Israel to score a political victory.
Biden’s speech on the brutal Hamas atrocities was a good speech, not in that he delivered it well or especially convincingly (let’s not even rehash the invented Golda Meir story) but it appeared to have been written by someone who cared enough to inject it with moral outrage and certainty. It would have been a better speech for someone else.
But rhetoric is relatively cheap in politics. More significant than the moral outrage are the actual policy statements. As many noted, there’s no mention of Iran. That’s not surprising as the administration’s position is not to mention Iran.
Here however is a policy moment that cuts against the thrust of the speech. Policy, unlike rhetoric, is all about specifics.
“My administration has consulted closely with Congress throughout this crisis. And when Congress returns, we’re going to ask them to take urgent action to fund the national security requirements of our critical partners.”
See anything odd here? Partners. Plural.
What partners? This speech is about supporting Israel in its fight against Hamas. Who are these other partners?
This one isn’t hard to guess. Biden ran into problems getting aid to Ukraine approved in the House. There was talk that he wanted to link aid to Israel to aid to Ukraine. Take that little added “s” as a strong signifier that it’s going to happen.
So what that really means is pressuring pro-Israel people to lobby House members to approve an aid package for Ukraine or military aid to Israel gets delayed at a crucial juncture. Which means Biden is using Israel to set a trap for House Republicans. So despite his assertion that “this is not about party or politics” assume that it is.
That’s a lot to hang on a single ‘s’, right? Biden misspeaks all the time.
Maybe, but we were warned that this was coming.
The White House is considering a move to attach Ukraine funding to a request for urgent aid to Israel, according to several people familiar with the deliberations, in the hopes that such a pairing would increase the chance that Congress would approve aid to Kyiv despite growing opposition from House Republicans.
No final decisions have been made on whether to link the requests, said two senior administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. One of the officials said such a move could make sense because it “jams the far right,” which is firmly opposed to more Ukraine aid but strongly supportive of aid to Israel.
That extra ‘s’ suggests that Biden has moved closer to a final decision. And really why not? Much like the government shutdowns, it puts the onus on House Republicans. If the package succeeds, Biden gets a win, if it fails, he can use it to attack Republicans. Israel gets exploited as bait for this trap by a guy who pretends to care, but actually doesn’t.
Ukraine – Israel aid linkage means that Israel facing the most significant war in a generation gets taken hostage to secure a win for Biden and Ukraine.
Eva says
I didn’t believe biden’s speech supporting Israel when he first made it anyway.
I believed that he would attempt to force Israel to back down and then make concessions to hamas like a vanquished enemy, and still believe that he will try to do this.
So any other evil plot he puts out there with regard to Israel is no surprise to me.
Puddin' Tain says
Joe Biden is evil, period. The entire U.S. government is infested with evil, self-interested beings. I refuse to refer to them as human, as human beings would not do what they do.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
So essentially, not supporting Ukraine supposedly gives him an out for not supporting Israel!
somehistory says
I saw where a grandchild of Golda Meir was murdered by hamas.
Billions given to ukrain and not told to “don’t be too hard on russia,” but ….
Just goes to show the inner heart and soul of the snake.
Kristen says
The corrupt, lying Ukrainian grifter has tons of dirt on the corrupt, lying American grifter. 10% for the big guy.