The New Yorker magazine has a long piece out about Biden’s ME policy. I don’t have a link for you because I read it on Libby (the library app, highly recommend). It’s titled “The Enabler” and the subtitle is “How Biden Emboldened Israel’s Aggression toward Gaza – and Iran”. The piece is a kind of validation for pro Palestinian and anti war activists who believe that Biden’s “bear hug” approach toward the far Right Israeli government was disastrous, not just for Gaza, but for the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Iran and also Israel. With friends like the US foreign policy establishment, Israel doesn’t need enemies.
At the outset I should say that Biden’s approach was absolutely that of the bipartisan foreign policy establishment. He did what we always do. It’s Hillary Clinton’s view, it’s Condeleeza Rice’s view, it’s Marco Rubio’s view and it’s the view of about 60 Senators - all of the GOP Senators and about 10 Dems on the Right side of the Party. Up until about two years ago it was the view of most congressional Democrats. That has changed, and in a profound way that (I believe) means there’s no going back. There’s pre genocide and post genocide. Democrats aren’t going to be able to throw off a couple of lines about a“two state solution” and how they really, truly follow international law and humanitarian norms, with the teeny tiny exception of “anything Israel does”.
In the article, we discover that the International Red Cross were the first to raise an alarm on Gaza. The author says the International Red Cross is credible to establishment figures in government because Red Cross have a specific statutory duty to inform state actors when state actors may be liable for war crimes. They were able to get through to the Biden Administration (in a way that many, many were not - Biden considers himself an expert on Israel and would not accept advice from anyone “on the ground” who contradicted his rather romanticized and archaic view regarding Israel). Mamdani says many people have “an idea” of Israel that they (understandably) love and may have once been true but is no longer true. I think both Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton are examples of that. I swear, nostalgia will kill us all, including Israelis.
They told Biden Israel was refusing access to humanitarian orgs in an unprecedented way (for comparison, even Syria allowed the Red Cross in to care for civilians). Further, they said in their estimation the Biden Administration was at risk of participating in “violations of law” – in other words, war crimes. But, Blinken kept telling Biden they were close to a deal with Israel and “two more weeks” became the operative Biden ME policy, as the dead civilians piled up and Israel grabbed more and more territory. It got so bad Biden forbid anyone saying “two more weeks”.
I thought about how “two more weeks” enabled a genocide when Hakeem Jeffries said this the day of the vote to stop arming Israel unless Israel stops violating the law:
“I will be voting no on Republican Amendment #8…. It is overly broad in that it prohibits or would limit the use of funds for longstanding initiatives related to humanitarian aid, refugee resettlement, peace-building and U.S. Embassy operations,” Jeffries wrote in a letter to his Democratic colleagues Tuesday. “In addition, the so-called Massie amendment would restrict our country’s ability to confront Hamas, Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations in the region who are sworn enemies of both the United States and Israel. In my view, there are more decisive ways to achieve the urgent change necessary when it comes to the far-right Netanyahu government.”
The “decisive way” that Jeffries plans to rein in the far Right Israeli government is to hope that Netanyahu finally loses an election and he isn’t replaced by someone who is also a lunatic (most likely) and Jeffries and the rest of the Democratic Right and Center can renegotiate an Israeli arms deal in 2028 that complies with US law, international law and humanitarian norms when it’s up for renewal, with an Israeli leader who is (perhaps!) not a genocidal maniac. Lotta contingencies there. Two more weeks.
So Biden’s “two more weeks” becomes Jeffries “two more years” and the bipartisan foreign policy establishment is protected from ever having to come up with a better idea than the massive failure “bear hug” of the Israeli Right and “bomb the shit out of some Muslims every ten years” they have pursued for the last 50 years.
There’s another way. In fact, there’s a whole set of ideas that could mean a new Democratic policy approach in the ME where we no longer just react to bad actors like Netanyahu and Trump and instead forge our own path. The Left side of this debate, the anti war side, has been absolutely blooming with all kinds of proposals and ideas that were shut out of the debate for too long. They are still mostly on Substack but it’s a smart and rigorous debate and I suggest looking into it. Roughly, it’s three positions, listed from Right to Left. The strictly legalistic approach of Van Hollen, the (actual) liberal Zionist approach of Brad Lander and Bernie Sanders, and the “Palestinian Freedom” approach of AOC, Mamdani and the 25% of the House on the Left. I’m most intrigued with the Palestinian Freedom approach because I think it is the only one that actually comports with international law and human dignity for both Palestinians and Israelis.
Here’s Van Hollen’s very moderate approach (gift link) that comports with international law and would be a good start. As background, Van Hollen has two “red lines” he will not compromise on – the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory has to end and Israel has to (finally) declare borders.
Democrats need to face a hard truth. While Republicans’ approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has failed, so has ours. The Democratic Party has provided reflexive and unconditional support to Israeli governments, even as their actions have increasingly undermined American interests and values.
For decades, we have called for a two-state solution, but we’ve failed to use our leverage to make it real. It’s past time that we use that leverage to end the occupation and achieve two states with full political and legal rights for all. That means withdrawing taxpayer support from Israel and conditioning arms sales.
More of my colleagues are realizing that the status quo is unacceptable. Forty Democrats recently voted to block the transfer of certain military equipment to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, compared with only 15 of us in April of last year.
To be clear, I support Israel’s need for security. But for too long most Democrats have unquestioningly accepted Israel’s argument that American weapons are needed and used solely for its defense. We have not yet fully confronted the fact that Israel has used its strength not only as a shield, but also as a sword to bury the two-state solution and advance the far right’s vision of a “Greater Israel.”
We have an opportunity to change the status quo on this, not because of anything our leaders did, but because thousands of 19 year olds worldwide saw a genocide playing out live on social media and raised holy hell, at great risk to themselves because their cowardly, coddled colleges and universities in the US capitulated and turned them over to our ethically bankrupt DOJ for the speech crime of being loudly pro Palestinian. Jake Tapper and Lindsey Graham taking huffy, entitled offense with what a 19 year old Lefty says is not a crime.
Read the Van Hollen position and later I’ll give you the (new) liberal Zionist position and then the Palestinian freedom position.
I would humbly suggest the center and Right in the Democratic Party put their heads together and come up with their own coherent policy that is different than that of the last 50 years of failure that culminated in a genocide. The Left side of the Party are hashing ours out. Until they do, all the substantive debate and policy ideas will be on the Left. As we used to say in the manager ranks at the Post Office, “plan beats no plan”.
