360 degrees of hostility: The Biden administration and Israel

by Caroline Glick

Seemingly with each passing day, the Biden administration announces a new initiative aimed at undermining Israel’s ability to defend itself, either by limiting its military options, constraining its diplomatic maneuvering room, empowering its enemies or inducing domestic discord and social cleavages.

The Mothers of IDF Soldiers group led a demonstration last week of army mothers, reservists in the Israel Defense Forces, bereaved families and other concerned citizens outside the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem. They demanded that President Joe Biden stop leveraging power to force Israel to resupply Hamas.

The following day, hundreds of Israelis, including parents of soldiers, families of hostages and terror victims gathered outside Ashdod Port. For hours, they blocked trucks laden with supplies for Gaza from exiting the port. Activists have been blocking trucks from entering Gaza via the Kerem Shalom and Nitzana border crossings for more than two weeks.

Speaking to the crowd in the southern Israeli city of Ashdod, Shifra Shahar, who runs a nonprofit organization that cares for the needs of soldiers, addressed her remarks to Israel’s leaders:

“Government of Israel, defense minister, IDF chief of staff, get ahold of yourselves!

“We had elections last year. I don’t recall voting for [U.S. Secretary of State Antony] Blinken! Blinken is sitting in the war cabinet and protecting the interests of my enemy. … We have sons in Gaza. We have sons fighting. The entry of the trucks endangers them, prolongs the war, increases the number of casualties and delays the return of the hostages!

“They tell me, ‘There are constraints.’ He who is constrained doesn’t win the war.

“They tell me, ‘The Americans are threatening not to provide us with ammunition.’

“To this, I say, if we were besieging them, we wouldn’t need ammunition! The war would end. They’d be screaming for help, returning the hostages and the war would end!”

The rising expressions of rage at the Biden administration from ordinary citizens are a testament to the shock and anger Israelis feel at what they perceive as a betrayal of Israel’s most basic interests by Biden and his top advisers.

Three and a half months ago, when Biden came to Israel, most Israelis couldn’t imagine his warm embrace would transform into a torrent of hostile actions.

At the height of Biden’s emotional visit, he gave a speech to the people of Israel: “I come to Israel with a single message. You are not alone. You are not alone. As long as the United States stands—and we will stand forever—we will not let you ever be alone.”

For the overwhelming majority of Israelis, Biden’s declaration sounded like a bankable guarantee. But for the few with more sensitive ears, it sounded like a threat—that he and his administration would never leave Israel alone to fight the war to victory.

As the weeks and months passed, it turned out that the latter had it right. The administration has never let Israel alone to win the war whose outcome will determine whether the Jewish state can long survive. At every turn, in every quarter, the United States is constraining, undermining, subverting and coercing Israel to make moves that, as Shahar said, are “against the interests of the citizens of Israel.”

Ceasefire agreement

The details of the hostages-for-terrorists-and-ceasefire talks that CIA director William Burns has been overseeing appear to involve Israel releasing from its prisons to Judea, Samaria and Gaza hundreds or perhaps thousands of Palestinian terrorists, including mass murderers. The initial reports asserted that the terms for the deal were 100-250 terrorists for each of the 136 hostages.

These terrorists can be expected to ignite Judea and Samaria and Israel’s major cities in a terror conflagration that would make the Oct. 7 slaughter look like a walk in the park. Terrorists released to Gaza can be expected to rebuild Hamas’s terror empire in the area.

The released terrorists and their comrades on the ground will be able to do these things because, in addition to requiring Israel to free them in exchange for at least some of the 136 Israeli hostages Hamas has been holding since Oct. 7, Burns’s deal requires Israel to end its military operations in Gaza for between one to two months. Based on interviews with Egyptian and Qatari officials involved in the hostage talks, both The Wall Street Journal and Qatari media have reported that the United States is telling Hamas through Egypt and Qatar that the deal is a trap for Israel. By compelling Israel to end its operations in Gaza for such a long period, Burns expects that the Netanyahu government will be unable to reinstate Israel’s operations when the hostages-for-terrorists swap is concluded.

The United States is intent on reaching a ceasefire because the Biden administration remains committed to its strategic objective of appeasing Iran at Israel’s expense. Over the past several days, the U.S. media has reported claims by U.S. intelligence officials asserting that Iran is not responsible for the war being waged by its proxies Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and the Iranian-controlled Shiite militias in Iraq and Syria. U.S. intelligence officials insist these terror armies are attacking the United States and Israel because Israel is fighting Hamas in Gaza. If Israel were to stop fighting, all the troubles would end.

From an Israeli perspective, the prospect of ending the war without dismantling Hamas is an unacceptable outcome. If Hamas is able to survive after conducting its one-day Holocaust in southern Israel, not only will Hamas be able to proclaim victory but Iran and its terror proxies surrounding Israel will be emboldened to strike Israel even more aggressively on multiple fronts.

Humanitarian Aid

On Jan. 23, Shin Bet director Ronen Bar informed Israel’s security cabinet that 60% to 70% of the so-called humanitarian aid entering Gaza daily either goes directly into Hamas’s hands or is commandeered by Hamas terrorists for their use. Bar’s admission bolstered eyewitness testimonies by Palestinians claiming that Hamas seized the aid trucks and footage from the Egyptian border with Gaza showing Hamas terrorists shooting at civilians seeking access to the supplies.

Under such circumstances, it is clear that the Biden administration’s pointed and ever-escalating demands that Israel permit more or less unlimited entry of supply-laden trucks to Gaza amounts to a demand that Israel resupply its enemy in the midst of war. As Shahar said, the constant supply of food, water, and, most critically, fuel to Hamas has enabled the terror group to maintain its presence in its underground warren of terror tunnels and continue to hold the Israeli hostages. The resupply also endangers Israel’s soldiers, who are forced to fight inside tunnels where Hamas has a tactical advantage.

From a strategic perspective, requiring Israel to resupply Hamas enables Hamas to retain its governing control over Gaza. So long as Hamas controls the supplies entering Gaza, it controls the distribution of those supplies. This compels the population to remain beholden to Hamas and not work with Israel to end the war by turning in Hamas terrorists or helping IDF forces locate and rescue the hostages.

Egyptian Border

The only way to provide humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza without assisting Hamas is to provide them with the same right afforded to those in war zones worldwide: The right to leave the war zone for third countries. From the outset of the war, the Biden administration has strongly opposed Israel’s efforts to persuade the Egyptian government to permit the people of Gaza to leave the area through the Rafah border crossing. In a speech last month in Tel Aviv, Secretary of State Antony Blinken reasserted U.S. opposition to permitting Gazans to leave the area.

“The United States unequivocally rejects any proposals advocating for the resettlement of Palestinians outside of Gaza,” he exhorted.

It isn’t that the Gazans have nowhere to go. Since Oct. 7, multiple countries, including Chechnya, Turkey, Scotland and Canada have stated their willingness to permit Gazans to seek refuge in their countries. Qatar, which serves as Hamas’s state sponsor, is another option. Rafah is a short drive from El Arish International Airport, where these refugees would be able to fly to third countries.

According to Britain’s Guardian newspaper, Gazans are currently forced to pay $10,000 in bribes to Egyptian border guards to cross into Egypt for refuge. Moreover, as of Feb. 4, the IDF assesses that Hamas has changed its tactics. Rather than fight IDF forces primarily from tunnels, Hamas is increasingly attacking Israeli units in Gaza and bombing Israel with rockets from within humanitarian safe zones where hundreds of thousands of Gazans are now sheltering.

Given the circumstances, the U.S. position requires Israel to choose between defeating Hamas at a profound cost to civilian lives or being defeated itself.

Weapons Supply

On Jan. 28, NBC News reported that the administration is considering slowing supplies of various weapons, including 155 mm artillery rounds and joint direct attack munitions (JDAMs) to Israel to compel Israel to scale back its ground operations in Gaza and permit more supplies to enter the area.

Although the White House denied the reports, the IDF has been compelled to conserve its ammunition on the ground due to shortages in supplies, indicating that the United States is slow-walking its supply of key armaments to Israel. This is of major concern, particularly given the near certainty of escalation along the northern front, where Hezbollah-controlled Lebanon is moving quickly towards a full-scale war with Israel.

Palestinian Statehood

For Israelis, Oct. 7 was an illusion-shattering event. One of the primary illusions shattered was the two-state paradigm. Hamas, which won the 2006 Palestinian elections—the last elections held by the rival Fatah faction’s Palestinian Authority—has maintained the support of the majority of Palestinians in Gaza and Judea and Samaria throughout the intervening years. On Oct. 7, it was Hamas that initiated and led the slaughter of 1,200 Israelis, but thousands of Gaza civilians followed them into Israel and were full participants in the atrocities; including murder, rape, torture, kidnapping and looting.

Avida Bachar survived the massacre at Kibbutz Be’eri, which saw Palestinians murder 130 people, including his wife and son, who were murdered next to Bachar and his daughter in the family’s safe room. Crews who recovered the bodies of the victims in Be’eri reported that 80% of the bodies showed signs of torture.

Be’eri is a kibbutz identified with the secular far-left. Its members included prominent peace activists. The surviving members have been forced to come to terms with the atrocities they suffered.

In an interview last month with Israel’s Channel 14, Bachar explained, “We need to ask if we are capable of coexisting there. The 7th of October showed that the level of evil there means that coexistence is apparently impossible. We can’t do it anymore. Because we gave them everything. They even worked in our community. And in the end, we were proven wrong. … We reached the point where their children burned us alive in our shelters. The older ones shot us through the doors. And anyone who tried to jump out the window—they shot him again. Their elderly, on wheelchairs, and their handicapped arrived at Kibbutz Be’eri, and they looted us and kidnapped us as hostages. We need to understand this situation. And when a person has infinite demands at negotiations, apparently, either we won’t be here or they won’t be here. We mustn’t leave.”

The overwhelming majority of Israelis agree with Bachar. Polls taken since Oct. 7 show that three-quarters of Israelis oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state. 70% of Israelis who voted for opposition parties, which include parties on the center and far-left, the Arab nationalist party and the Islamist party, believe that there is no chance of peaceful coexistence with the Palestinians.

This position places the Israeli people, rather than simply the government, at odds with the Biden administration, which since the outset of the war has insisted that its strategic goal is to establish a Palestinian state in Gaza and Judea and Samaria under the leadership of the Palestinian Authority. The P.A., for its part, not only refuses to condemn the Oct. 7 slaughter but seeks to form a unity government with Hamas. Fatah forces in Gaza participated alongside Hamas terrorists in the slaughter of Oct. 7 and posted videos of themselves killing Israelis on their Telegram pages.

Biden and his advisers state regularly that Hamas does not represent the Palestinian people. But the Palestinian people disagree wholeheartedly. According to Palestinian pollsters, 75% of Palestinians support Hamas.

Last week, it was reported that the State Department is considering unilateral U.S. recognition of a “State of Palestine.” Such a move would not merely be an act of hostility against Israel. It would constitute a material breach of the Oslo Accords, of which the U.S. is a signatory. The agreements signed in the 1990s by Israel and the Palestinians under U.S. aegis barred the Palestinians from unilaterally forming a state or using the international arena as a means to settle the Palestinian conflict with Israel. Under the Oslo Accords, all agreements between Israel and the Palestinians must be reached through bilateral negotiations.

Foreign Workers

As Bachar noted, among the participants in the Oct. 7 slaughter were workers who had been employed by the assaulted kibbutzim, in some cases for decades. Those workers provided precise intelligence on the kibbutzim down to the number of people per household, the location of communal weapons stores, and the homes of soldiers and security forces, among other things.

Polling of Palestinians in Gaza and Judea and Samaria found that more than 80% of the Palestinians support the massacres of Oct. 7. Due to the massive levels of public support for the massacres, and the service Palestinian workers provided Hamas as intelligence gatherers, the Israeli government passed a decision barring Palestinians from working in Israel. To replace the Palestinians, the government decided to permit foreign workers from friendly countries, including India, to enter Israel on work permits. Economy Minister Nir Barkat finalized an agreement on the entry of Indian workers with his Indian counterpart.

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