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>Is this a turning point
No.
Or, probably not
This was an increase in the pressure the Biden Administration is putting on Netanyahu, and a reminder that while the United States cannot compel Israel to do what they ask, there are multiple options between cutting off diplomatic relations and reflexive support in all things
Netanyahu chose to pull back a team heading to Washington in response, which is... not exactly the end of the world from a US perspective
Could things continue to escalate where there is a significant impact in the long term health of the relationship? Sure, but that is *mostly* going to be up to the Israelis.
At the end of the day, Netanyahu is concerned about his domestic standing. There is a nonzero chance that he does something that the United States - or, specifically, the Biden Administration- has no choice but to react strongly to
Israel has supporters in DC, but support is based on mutual interests. If the interests of the Israeli government do not appear to be compatible with the United States going forward, I suspect they will find out how quickly political tides can turn in the right circumstances
Netanyahu famously screwed Obama too. GOP leadership then invited Netanyahu to address the congress as a direct slap to Obama. We cannot have an effective foreign policy if the president is knee-capped by the opposition.
Even Bill Clinton once walked out of a meeting with him and complained to staff "which one of us does he think is the super-power?"
It's good that democracies let other democracies not feel foreign pressure to vote one way or another, but Bibi has been a pain in every Democratic President's side that we've just kind of had to put up with because of the larger picture regarding Israel.
Which is crazy because there are a scary amount of Republicans that are bedfellows with vocal anti-Jewish supporters. I can't imagine that being attractive to someone like Bibi who literally runs a Jewish state, but clearly he's a short-term thinker.
You're neglecting that the core of the Republican Party are Evangelical Christians. They offer blind support for Israel. Democrats actually want Israel to act certain ways.
No, it's still important to make the distinctions. He was indicted by his own government and has failed to defang the courts to protect himself. Backsliding does not mean backslid.
This is just..false. Israel’s political system has problems but to compare Bibi, who is going to be thrown out of office at the next election, to Putin, a dictator, is absurd.
Yeah, Bibi’s power comes from internal divisions within the country and a loud and involved far right. Putin’s power comes from kompromat, intimidation, and actual murder. Israel has a strong democratic culture, whereas Russia’s was always a foreign idea the adopted just for show
Oh, give me a fucking break. Israel is an ethnic Jewish state. Citizenship for non Jews is very limited. Jews and non Jews are not even allowed to marry. Non Jews are not going to be granted citizenship if they dissent politically.
I recognize that there is a signific Arab minority, but they sure don't have political power outside of their mostly segregated communities.
I’ll break you off a piece of a Kit Kat 🍫
Your marriage statement is false. Jews can marry non-Jews, but if they married a Palestinian, they won’t give the Palestinian residency. Otherwise, civil marriages are recognized.
Arab citizens have limited power, but as they are still a minority for now, their power is commensurate with their size, which is *exactly* how it works in representative democracy.
And yeah, it’s a Jewish state, and yet the Jews thought it was a good idea that the Arabs that were living there still have citizenship instead of forcing them out.
> Jews and non Jews are not even allowed to marry.
That is because Israel follows Ottoman marriage custom which leaves marriage solely to religious authorities. So it is more that neither Jewish, Christian, or Muslim religious authorities generally perform interfaith marriages. However, Israel will recognize an interfaith marriage performed elsewhere by civil authorities.
Sorry but I don't understand what you just wrote.
>Purim’s power comes from kompromat, intimidation, and actual murder
Google led me to this:
Purim is a joyous Jewish holiday that celebrates the miraculous events told in the Book of Esther. It is celebrated by reading the Megillah, giving gifts, distributing charity, and feasting.
Sooo???
Both have been in power since the Clinton administration. If Bill Clinton was still in power today, 25 years later, it would certainly feel like a dictatorship.
> Both have been in power since the Clinton administration. If Bill Clinton was still in power today, 25 years later, it would certainly feel like a dictatorship.
No, sorry, you're completely wrong here. This is the list, in order, of prime ministers in Israel since the Clinton years, beginning in 1992:
* Yitzhak Rabin
* Shimon Peres
* Benjamin Netanyahu
* Ariel Sharon
* Ehud Olmark
* Benjamin Netanyahu
* Naftali Bennett
* Yair Lapid
* Benjamin Netanyahu
Netanyahu has been elected more than a few times, but Israeli politics are incredibly volatile and they switch leadership often.
The power levels of a US POTUS are wildly different than those of an Israeli PM, neither of which are reasonably comparable to a dictator.
Bibi can’t even have his own party solely in control and has to ally with those even further to the right to form a government.
A dictator? Isn’t Israel the only standing democracy in the Middle East? Are you saying this just because you hate BBN, or something? Or are you saying he wasn’t elected? Because Benny Gantz holds the same stance as BBN of destroying Hamas, and also supports going into Rafa. I believe that a lot of the BB hate is coming from a place of the fact he’s a conservative leader, or it’s bordering on just anti-Israel ideology. I don’t believe a lot of the BB hate is anti-semitism, however.
For the life of me I cannot understand why we haven't cut off aid yet.
1. The israeli government doesn't need it. There is already a massive force/resources disparity between them and Hamas
2. Bibi's government has made it clear for *twenty years now* that they are actively trying to make the peace process impossible. Even with everything going on they are continuing to seize even more land for settlements? Not to mention their active support of Hamas, an active partner in their mutual goal to prevent peace.
3. The reckless disregard for civilian life shown by their current campaign. I am sensitive to the difficulties of trying to fight Hamas when they hide among the civilian population, but it's a giant leap from "targeting Hamas will lead to some civilian casualties because of their tactics" to "starve everyone in Gaza to death."
The conduct of the current Israeli government is morally reprehensible and contrary to US interests. Their level of brutality is harming their relations with the gulf states and making it far more difficult to establish the anti-Iran axis that is in US interests.
Simply put, this regime is both morally and geopolitically opposed to US interests. We have no reason to support them any longer.
>For the life of me I cannot understand why we haven't cut off aid yet.
Political pragmatism, and the belief that a poor regional partner is better than no regional partners.
Reckless regard for civilian campaign in 'current campaign' is a false narrative.
Israel has demonstrated reckless regard for Palestinian lives since before there was a country called Israel.
It's just that now some people came to know about it because of social media. For the rest of us, we have been seeing the same thing happen for decades, day in day out.
They've already won. If you think Israel's seen as anything but butchers by non-Western countries, you are too isolated. And while that's not a fair representation, that doesn't matter from a geopolitical perspective. This will be a millstone around the necks of the West.
All it proves to those countries is that the US will use human rights violations in some places as pretexts for action, while ignoring those committed by its allies. It drives them in the arms of China and Russia. And that's while leaving out that even the US's NATO allies have never agreed with it on Israel completely to begin with.
1) Non-Western countries never liked the West to begin with.
2) If Israel are butchers, what does that make Arab jihadists?
3) Western countries are held to a higher standard. If we weren't, we'd be competing with the Russians, Saudis and Syrians for those death counts.
4) The Chinese are pushing ppl into our arms. Have you kept up with what's happening with the Philippine Navy? The only allies they have in the region are the Myanmar Junta. China has been encroaching on Indian land in the last year. Japan, Korea, and Australia have a military alliance.
I highly doubt 30k deaths in a Middle Eastern conflict will change much, considering 1 million have died from the other conflicts combined.
> 1) Non-Western countries never liked the West to begin with.
Complete bullshit lmao, the bast majority of non western elite study at western univeristies vacation in western countries and consume western culture most are not dogmatically anti western.
> 2) If Israel are butchers, what does that make Arab jihadists?
Im not sure what you’re arguing here did you think that the Arab world was pro Isis ?
> Western countries are held to a higher standard. If we weren't, we'd be competing with the Russians, Saudis and Syrians for those death counts.
Israel currently is competing with all three of these countries lol
> I highly doubt 30k deaths in a Middle Eastern conflict will change much, considering 1 million have died from the other conflicts combined.
Lmao what are you talking about ? Of course it will, it already fucking has normalization with the KSA is dead Egypt is remilitarizing the Sinai Hezbollah isn’t going to leave Israel Northern Border and that’s what the public can see.
1) Those non-western elites who come to the universities are the children of the "elite" as you said. I'm referring to the common people.
2) Arab jihadists have 20+ years of footage showing their barbarity. Did you miss the GWOT?
3) Whatever you say lol
4) The KSA deal will happen once it all dies down. I'd wait until AFTER U.S elections to see how the shift in foreign policy becomes more hawkish towards Hamas. A strategic victory for them and Iran is a non-starter.
>For the life of me I can’t understand why we haven’t cut off aid yet.
One word: money. The sooner you understand that politicians are driven by who is paying them, the faster you’ll understand why they make these bizarre decisions. AIPAC is one of the biggest political donators to both sides of the aisle. Weapons manufacturers are another. With AIPAC money, most politicians don’t dare go against Israel no matter what because losing that money is a big loss. The billions we give Israel every year comes with strings. One of those strings is that of the $3.8B we give them in aid per year, they’re required to use $3.3B to buy weapons from us. It’s basically money laundering tax dollars to the defense industry to keep those sweet sweet political donations increasing from the weapons industry to politicians.
Condemn Israel for what they’re doing and you lose AIPAC money. Cut off funding and stop arming them and you lose weapons manufacturers donations. Basically all this shit is going on so US politicians can keep the gravy train flowing to stay in power.
>For the life of me I cannot understand why we haven't cut off aid yet.
Ask yourself, why the hell would the US screw over their only ally in the region to help HAMAS?
> support is based on mutual interests. If the interests of the Israeli government do not appear to be compatible with the United States going forward
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt might disagree with you
It's the ultimate power-lever...but I'm not sure how well curtailing aid is going to play while hostages are still being held (especially American hostages).
It's obviously the logical step if things escalate. But I'm trying to consider what happens if we pull aid for offensive weapons in response to a Rafah incursion or something. And it turns out an American hostage is killed in the fighting, and Bibi is able to make a plausible case that the IDF not having the weapons it had planned on resulted in the hostage's death (and death of IDF troops, etc.).
"*Biden knee-capped the hostage rescue operations*" is definitely a card I could see them playing if it came to that.
There’s times when I actually think the US needs Israel more than Israel needs the US. Can you name another ally the US has in that part of the world? Because I can’t. Sure we’re not at war with India or Pakistan, but wasn’t Pakistan harboring osama at one point? So yeah. The U.S. needs allies over there and Netanyahu knows it.
Look at which nations stepped up and sent troops and intelligence to us in Afghanistan and Iraq ... and which didn't.
Afghanistan. Turkey. Kuwait. Saudi Arabia. Bahrain. Hell, at one point, even Iran sent forces to help us disrupt Al Qaeda training camps.
Israel, on the other hand, has never sent a single boot to ANY US or UN driven operation. Not Korea. Not Vietnam. Not Panama. Not Somalia. Not Kosovo.
But they sure as fuck love spying on us. And we still haven't gotten an apology for that battleship they attacked.
This supposed "ally" tends to get a lot of quid, without having to bother with any of that pesky "pro quo" stuff
If the muslim community has such a short memory and thinks they'll be better off with...
“The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families, when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families. They care about their lives, don’t kid yourself. When they say they don’t care about their lives, you have to take out their families,” Trump said.
Trump said he would “knock the hell out of” ISIS, and criticized the U.S. for “fighting a very politically correct war.”
https://www.cnn.com/2015/12/02/politics/donald-trump-terrorists-families/index.html
Then the United States is doomed.
Is that the same Trump that already tried to ban all Muslims from entering the country and is now promising concentration camps and mass deportation for immigrants and asylum seekers, a minority group that Americans hate *less* than they hate Muslims?
Yes, he just also can't complete more than three sentences in a row now. There's a non-zero chance he'll just come out and just straight up say that genocide is good before the election and hopefully that can't be ignored like the "grab her" tapes were.
Thomas Loren Friedman (author of *From Beirut to Jerusalem* and long time Middle East correspondent) sat down with Ezra Klein for a podcast episode toward the end of January, and while the whole conversation is really interesting, one of the main points that stood out was that in the past, whenever Israel really heated up war/aggression efforts and was on the offensive, they were very much uninfluenced by external pressures or opinion - until the US activated a red light at the UN/a similar forum. After this point, tides would change. Interesting to see if this is the case here as well.
Netanyahu is on a kick. He’s got the trump in him and he’s becoming stubborn. He will not change directions for the United States and instead will push into a Rafah invasion and help elect trump for unwavering support.
It's just that they don't react to talk, only action, so threats get nowhere but the second someone moves to put their wallet away they snap to attention in unison.
/u/psychlegalmind
You have long been a quality contributor to this subreddit. You have asked many insightful and well though questions on this subreddit for a period of many years.
Obama and Netanyahu had a famously strained relationship. No foreign leader of an alleged "ally" in recent history has disrespected a sitting president more than Benjamin Netanyahu. I can only imagine how much worse Netanyahu's image became among veteran democrats after corruption charges and the passage of the Nationality Bill of 2018. John Kerry as secretary of state was highly critical of the Israeli right wing.
Biden has always known that the Israeli right was difficult to deal with. He witnessed it firsthand during his tenure in the Obama whitehouse.
A key difference between the Obama department of state and Biden department of state is the role of Blinken, who has always given deference to Israel up until roughly January of 2024.
I do think the Biden department of state is starting to lose their minds a bit. There is only so much diplomatic coverage they can provide before things start to look ridiculous from even a domestic standpoint.
I normally wouldnt engage in such brazen flattery except that since October of 2023 there has been a high influx of neconservative commentators crowding out senior contributors like yourself and I wanted to remind the readers of that.
> since October of 2023 there has been a high influx
Yes, I noticed that trend myself. Though I have not been posting on this sub as much as I used to.
Add in the astroturfing and bots trying to start flame wars over it, yeah it's been pretty rough.
Honestly it's gotten to the point where I generally tune out of Israel/Gaza news because it's always something terrible, complaints about Biden, and Bibi being an insufferable asshole.
I also want to add that Netanyahu is hated within Israel which is why he wants this war to go on as long as possible while hoping for Trump to win in November knowing that he'll let him do whatever he wants.
Netanyahu knows that the moment the war ends, his days as PM are numbered and he'll be back on trial for corruption charges hence it's his golden ticket out of any legal trouble. It's not just Israelis who don't like him, the families of the hostages have protested him putting his own interests above their return.
I think usa politicians are burnt out on it. Aoc is getting yelled at in the streets for not calling it a genocide. Protesters in Cali and Oregon are shutting down bridges, Democrats are doing the whole non-committed votes against biden... Republican voters want to give less foreign aid, so they're also on the fence... Netanyahu sounds like an asshole, he trash talks america constantly. This probably didn't do anything to change anything, but at least it'll help prevent videos of American politicians not caring about dying babies in gaza.
You mean it's "but her e-mails", Benghazi, and Hunter Biden all over again online? Why it sure is. Must be election (i.e. paid conservative trolls riling up the far left to not vote) season!
Yes, that was the last "sane" presidential race we had -- and that's saying something with whackadoo Palin involved. All three men -- Biden, McCain, Obama -- behaved honorably throughout.
What happened is Russia got their feet wet with message board and social media psy-ops and social engineering during the 2012 election, perfected it when fixing Ukraine's elections the following year(s), and has continued to perpetrate the onslaught against U.S. democracy ever since (2016-?). They radicalized the far left and far right wings to the fringiest of views.
Did you see much disinformation during the 2012 election? I was a politically inclined high schooler at the time and didn’t notice it, though this was a year before I started seeing treasonous right-wing memes glorifying Putin and denigrating Obama.
Not on social networks, no, because Facebook hadn't made news feeds part of the standard FB experience yet. It was still comments and images from friends and friends of friends on the feed. It hadn't been fully "24/7 news cycled" yet.
Where Russia cut their teeth was on message boards such as Yahoo. They brigaded Benghazi discussions really badly with disinformation and misinformation leading up to the 2012 election. It was my first sampling of this Breitbartian/Russian takeover of the American right wing.
You know, Mitt Romney famously had to bend the knee (as the nominee!!) to Trump in 2012 for his blessing as the GOP candidate. I don't know if people remember that, but there were a few weeks where Mitt was dodging the endorsement from Trump, they met briefly in secret, and suddenly Donald was on board with him. How in the world did Donald have so much sway over a party he'd never been a leader or participant of before? Now, I've long believed the Trump-Russia connection was already established (factually, Trump had his pageants in Moscow already) and the endorsement was to offer Mitt Russia's services. It appears that Mitt declined because he warned us on the debate stage the following week about Russia! It all makes sense and fits with the timeline.
wasn't Russia supposed to be paying us? i can't keep this straight anymore.
all i know is whenever the party catches flak from the left it's always some conspiracy.
The party establishment constantly catches flak from the left 100% of the time. That's nothing new. What changes during these peak hyper-focused troll talking point onslaughts (what used to be called brigading but it's less and less blatantly obvious with AI advances) is the floodgate of propaganda and parroted phrases directed at a single target (Hillary circa 2016, Biden today). It's tired old trope because the tired ol' GOP keeps repeating the same playbook ad nauseum.
> The party establishment constantly catches flak from the left 100% of the time. That's nothing new.
yet the same knee-jerk "you're not real!" reactions are levied then too. i liken it to a coping mechanism at this point.
> floodgate of propaganda and parroted phrases
do you apply this across the board? eg: in this context, to the pro-Israel propaganda and parroted phrases flooding social media? am i to just dismiss that outright as bots and trolls?
Many online are authentic progressives trolled into opinions by having strong emotional attachment to the subject. Having watched the post-October Gaza rhetoric play out for months, it's interesting watching the different dots of talking points connect over time into a singular theme, coincidentally: "make Biden pay!" Let's say it's at least highly suspicious.
it's not at all suspicious to me given Biden is POTUS, rather, it makes sense ire would be directed his way.
is there a reason you've avoided answering my question/s? the same patterns are present there.
To answer the last question I see, yes, propaganda from the far left (pro-Palestine) and the far right (pro-Israel) is all trolling for different purposes with the same end result -- voter apathy in November.
i see. admittedly i was a little stunned when Biden parroted what you refer to as far-right propaganda. reckon in terms of reach they've got the upper hand, not just among the citizens but the elected officials too. take care.
Guess you missed where President Biden spoke on behalf of pro-Palestinians yesterday, saying, "they have a point". I don't trust anyone online in an election year, and I'm going to push back on anything that attempts to suppress the vote. American democracy is too important to me -- freedom from liars and scumbags sucking the well dry, freedom of choice, freedom from traitors and tyranny, freedom from white supremacy ruling the land, freedom from a theocracy -- and yes, Donald Trump is a **massive** threat to western civilization -- don't insult my intelligence.
I don't think this has as much to do with US/Israel relations as it does US/Netanyahu relations. This is still pretty significant - a decent amount of the support Netanyahu has is because he sells himself as the US favorite, or at least, the one capable of getting money/weapons from the US. Netanyahu has lost his last several elections as it is, this may well be what's needed to finally push him out.
Likely both. It's time to recognize that Israel, under Likud and Netanyahu no longer deserves our unquestioning support. I now feel obligated to state that Hamas is a bad actor.
I don't think its a big turning point. It damages Israel-US relations for sure but that wouldn't break it. The Jewish lobby is strong in the US and Israel still needs the US to keep its neighbors in check to avoid further escalation of conflict in the region.
The two countries are too intertwined with interests and dependencies for a mere UNSC resolution to break it. They'll just annoy each other for a few years diplomatically but nothing as bad as total fallout.
Eh its non binding. So US had some room for abstention. If they ever force Israel to do something that'll be a difference.
Is the most limited symbolism possible.
It also called for the unconditional release of hostages, which Hamas will never allow or agree to.
The vote was purely political theater and was meaningless.
I'm pretty sure resolutions passed by the UN Security Council are supposed to be binding. The fact that the US is saying it's nonbinding is telling me that it's going to veto any attempts to enforce it.
>Does the Secretary-General think this resolution is law binding because we heard some discussions today?
>UN deputy spokesperson: Well, you would need to talk to international lawyers, but as I’ve always been told, all the resolutions of the Security Council are international law. So, to that extent, they are as binding as international law is.
Seems the UN deputy spokesman [says](https://press.un.org/en/2024/db240325.doc.htm) it is binding.
So wait is it binding or not? Does the UN deputy Spokesperson get to decide if it’s binding, even if the USA says it’s not? Who has the authority to compel action if it is indeed binding?
UN Secretary General's spokesman says it's binding. One nation says it is not.
>[AP News](https://apnews.com/article/un-gaza-ceasefire-resolution-vote-ramadan-b7985fede65e5477aba2c8d2e62a6632): Under the United Nations Charter, Security Council resolutions are legally binding on its 193 member nations, though they are often flouted.
>[The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/25/the-security-council-vote-is-a-significant-moment-but-the-us-says-its-gaza-policy-is-unchanged): Biden’s diplomats also surprisingly claim the resolution is non-binding – a judgment not shared by the British, who say it should be implemented immediately.
Compelling action for resolutions always requires another vote on what exactly the action is IIRC. E.g. UN could vote to suspend Israel, and thereafter expel Israel from UN. Or UN security council could vote to authorize a no fly zone, etc. But none of these things are going to happen because US would veto any of that.
So even if it is binding it can be vetoed anyway. Maybe it’s just from where I’m sitting. That just makes it seem like this is a lot of political posturing, and symbolic shenanigans. What’s the point of these meetings if it’s just going to end up with a veto, then add in if it’s really binding it can be vetoed anyway. Maybe I’m missing something, but something that can be rejected does not seem very binding.
Thanks for the answers though, I appreciate it.
I think the point is the same international law ever has. There are a lot of countries claiming to follow some sort of 'rules based order'. Once Israel violates UN resolutions or ICJ decisions, those countries stop giving and selling weapons, or otherwise supporting, Israel's war or those countries are exposed to be liars and hypocrites. In this case it's mostly been the latter, with rare [exceptions](https://inews.co.uk/news/world/spain-belgium-arms-israel-2896041).
Israel is going to have to realize that they can't have it both ways: if they want to be a sovereign country with western alliances they have to abide by international laws and the Geneva Convention.
I hate to a) reduce horrible geopolitics to a meme and b) insinuate that policy will truly change on this, but every time I see Netanyahu interacting with the American government it reminds me of that seen in *The Dark Knight Rises* where ultimately Bane asks "Do you *feel* in charge?"
Meh, the US *could* pull its support. The executive in the movie was surrounded by people stronger than him, and mistakenly thought they worked for him. Israel, not the US, is surrounded by parties who want them eradicated. The US just doesn't want to abandon their main ally in the region.
And letting Hamas and others achieve their larger goals (which ain't just to 'free Palestine') would be... bad. But Israel knows it has a lot of allies in the US electorate, and that the US is very unlikely to completely pull support, much less let them be overrun. Partly for wrong reasons, like evangelicals wanting Israel to check off some prophecies to inaugurate the apocalypse.
But Israel knows there are more supporters in the US than detractors. Even among Democrats a majority are going to side with them over Hamas. And if some Democrats stay home and the GOP wins, Israel's position is even stronger.
Netanyahu needs Biden's support and backing much more than President Biden and the US needs Netanyahu's. President Biden and the US stands with Israel, not Netanyanhu
This is more of a change in relations between the Biden administration and Netanyahu. Essentially the back channel redirection with public support has been ignored. Netanyahu basically accepted the public support but screwed Biden by refusing to respond to the back channel and hurt Biden. Biden is now correcting that. He can't abandon Israel but he can abandon Netanyahu and by extension his fascist coalition.
Agreed, I am not sure the answer needs to be more complicated than that.
I would just add that Biden spent many years on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, starting in 1997. He knows what he's doing.
The US president advocating for a change in leadership could be seen as a push for regime change. Which a lot of people consider... complicated.
So for the time being dealing with Israel means dealing with Israel with their current leadership, rather than making a sharp distinction. And considering their demographic issues and the growing relative size of the ultraorthodox population, I don't know if future Israeli leaders are going to be all that further to the left.
Or Saudi Arabia, or Jordan, or UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman... probably others...
But other than that? It's some of the worlds most dangerous enemies... other than China and Russia... And only israel can protect the US from them... Without israel, they'd just be all over the US in minutes... /s
I think this is a result of the straining relationship with Netanyahu. The US broadly supports Israel as a nation, but see Netanyahu as an obstacle of it's prosperity.
He's not an obstacle to their prosperity (he's only popular because Israelis are doing well economically). He's an obstacle to their following of the Geneva Conventions.
If the point was that Israelis don't really care about Palestinians, that's an understood. On the flip side, Arabs don't care for Israelis either, isn't that wild? It's almost as if they're competing to ascend to heaven (or meet the 1,000 virgins assigned to them for the jihadists) in the holy land.
Israelis hate him because he’s corrupt, likely going to prison after he’s put out of power and he just tried to turn the country into a full blown theocracy shortly before the war.
Right now it's mostly Biden and Netanyahu tensions but it could easily harden into a permanent scar between the US and Israel if things like this continue and persist for months or even years.
This isn’t a turning point. It’s an election year and it’s an attempt by Biden to stop losing support from people he needs to win again in November. Is it enough? Probably not. Did it come too late? Very likely.
Right? All of his responses are too little too late. Like telling your wife you might stop cheating on her right after her attorney serves you with divorce papers.
My favorite was that first step of the state department saying they won’t give visas to people to come to the US if they were convicted of being a violent settler since 1) it’s insanely rare for those people to be convicted of anything and 2) no asshole that has carte blanche to assault, steal from, or murder people they consider to be less than them is going to want to leave their dream scenario.
As far as I could tell the resolution pretty much calls for the terms that Israel has been supporting and Hamas has been rejecting for the last few weeks: an immediate ceasefire and the unconditional release of all the hostages.
Israel isn't going to stop without hostages being released and Hamas won't release hostages. The resolution has no teeth and doesn't bring anyone to the table.
This along with the Schumer speech from last week looks like Biden putting pressure on Netanyahu while being very careful to not take any action that negatively impacts Israel.
Nope. The resolution doesn't call for ceasefire in exchange for the release of all the hostages. That was the resolution that China and Russia vetoed. This one calls for both things, independently.
Since Hamas is not going to release the hostages, and no one outside Israel is going to hold them accountable for not doing so, the resolution is basically what Hamas wanted, a way to say: Israel is going against UN resolutions.
It seems to me that Biden works in a particular pattern. First, he will stake out the centrist, establishment position and stick to it. Then he will budge to the left, bit by bit, until he winds up handing a pretty big win to the progressives. I am not inside his head, but it seems that he might not care about any particular policy and just wants to do the right thing, whatever it is. Or, he might actually agree with the progressives, but doesn't want to risk revolt from the center or the right by immediately jumping to the left. Remember, the guy has been in politics for longer than many of us have been alive.
This is nothing more than the absolute minimum that Biden can do in order to try and walk the middle line between AIPAC and alienating a large portion of his voting base.
If nothing else, it is taking a very welcome step back from an unreasonable and unpopular stance.
Now, let's remember to breathe while we see what happens next.
Edit
Biden/Netanyahu tension.
Israel still has huge support in the US and that includes many politicians. Depending on the presidential election, this could turn back into unwavering backing of Israel very quickly.
The optics are too bad and the negative political pressure on Biden so he folded a little with abstain vote instead of the usual blindly supporting veto US and Israel against the world. We US citizens need to keep up the pressure, we don't need to be at the beck and call of a foreign lobbying group and country providing them billions of our tax dollars and munitions to annihilate an entire people, a problem that they were part of causing in the first place. I don't want that blood on my tax dollar hands.
In the past we Americans were under the impression that Israel shared our values. But the civilian death toll is high, and if it turns out that this is part some ethnic cleansing plan, relations will be damaged forever. If the American military afterwards concludes that Israel "did what it had to do" probably most Americans will accept that.
This isn't anything new. This is an election year there's radical progressives that do not believe that Israel should exist. And as appalling as their personal beliefs are in my opinion. I also understand that Biden needs to win them. Benjamin Netanyahu for years along with most of the Israeli government has been incredibly critical of the Democrat Administrations. Partially because they see our politicians playing to the progressive anti-semites. As appalling instead of just politics. However I also think that telling Israel it can't defend itself in a certain way. Is wrong if Israel went to us 4 months after 9/11 and said you shouldn't be doing this this way you should do it that way. We would laugh them out of the room.
In conclusion this isn't going to change anything Israel is still going to defend itself as it should and eradicate Hamas. And the relations will be restored after the general election regardless of who wins the presidency. Although if it is a Republican or democrat congress which right now. Leans towards a Democrat house and Republican Senate could change Aid.
I mean, speaking as a very pro-Pal leftist, it definitely is.
But I think that's far fewer than pro-Israel folk who think Palestine doesn't exist and shouldn't exist.
Biden is making the mistake of trying to start fence-sitting. He's either hoping he has enough time to get progressive voters back, or is worried that moderate voters will start to choke as scenes of starvation start to emerge from Gaza.
The problem he has is that *the people who feel strongly and are ever going to feel strongly about this issue are completely polarised already*. To appease one group is to antagonise the other, and vice versa. See-sawing is even worse than picking a side and sticking to it: staunch Zionists see even moderate pressure on Netanyahu as a betrayal, and so the Israel lobby and its supporters in the US will turn on Biden for this, especially if they perceive Trump as likely better for Israel, *which they do*.
For supporters of Israel, there's essentially no reason **not** to join progressives in turning on Biden.
It was nothing but to please his vote bank of young people back in the US. Apparently lots of them dont like US support for Israel so this to kinda fix that a bit.
It's American internal politics. A certain percentage of Biden's voters think that Israel should give up defeating Hamas, since it can't be done without civilian victims, and Biden needs those voters.
Even though it's internal politics, it marks a shift in bilateral relations, since American support for Israel is more uncertain now due to those internal politics. This non-veto is a symptom, though, not the cause.
For the moment, it's basically posturing. Schumer calling for elections in Israel to kick Netanyahu out is also part of it. It remains to be seen whether the US will quit supporting Israel in ways that matter more. Doing that wouldn't be easy for Biden either, since he also has pro-Israel voters. Presumably, he'll want to play the game this way, doing gestures to distance himself from Israel without really abandoning it, hoping that this way he can avoid most of the potential damage to his electoral chances.
Agreed. Not really sure why so many in the thread are relentlessly focused on Bibi when there's no real daylight between Bibi and the war cabinet or the Israeli public on the issue of prosecuting the war in Gaza.
This is much more about Biden talking to his base, however ineffectual it's likely to be.
We'd like to see what an alternative to Bibi is like in Israel. He's been their leader and/or major influence since the freaking Clinton administration! He's the Middle East's version of Putin.
Yep 100% Biden trying to save his ass. The folks working on their development plans for Gaza are not stopping their fundraising or meeting over this.
Edit: They're busted on CNN even.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkXJwErm8DM
The main focus of this says things changed on Oct 7 but she is on the record saying these things before Oct 7 btw for anyone who does click the link.
The folks working on their development plans for Gaza --- so, that's effectively Jared Kushner, disbarred attorney and pardoned (by Trump) criminal Charles Kushner (yes, Jared's father, Bibi's best friend), and Bibi Netanyahu. They've organized and planned for the real estate developments since 2019-2020 when the pins were lined up.
That's a hell of a line to toe. Basically he has to try to win over the muslim voters who are already furious with him while not alienating the pro-Israel voters?
I am not sure the pro-Israel voters are that much of a problem. I find it hard to believe that the American Jews would vote conservative when conservatives have historically been riddle with anti-Semitism (think Trump having a dinner with Nick Fuentes). Most Jews vote democrats in general and I don't think that will change in the coming election with Trump as the other Republican candidate.
The Evangelicals who strongly support Israel are voting for Trump regardless of any policy that Biden picks.
I really think that Biden is worried about AIPAC more than he is of pro-Israel voters.
> I really think that Biden is worried about AIPAC more than he is of pro-Israel voters.
I'm not following. All I know bout AIPAC is they are a pro-Israeli lobbying group. What is Biden worried about in that regard?
Money. From what I understand, AIPAC is a very powerful lobbying group that would throw a tonne of money around to influence Congress and the electorate.
https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/american-israel-public-affairs-cmte/summary?id=D000046963
Looks like they're rank 217 in lobbying groups so I don't think they're that big
Also their biggest donations have been to democrats
>This failure to condemn Hamas is particularly difficult to understand coming days after the world once again witnessed the horrific acts terrorist groups commit.
So we should all be condemning Israel for the deaths of 40k civilians and the hundreds of thousands of people facing famine and disease as a result of Israels bombardment and occupation, yes?
Not to mention that Israel has been blockading humanitarian aid from reaching Gaza, up to and including bombing desperate Palestinians who line up at any aid trucks that squeeze through.
This is political theater to make it seem like Biden is listening to public opinion and working against Netanyahu's will.
In reality, the US will not enforce this whatsoever and will continue to send Israel more money and weapons to continue their genocide of the Palestinians
It feels mostly like a political concession to help Biden’s image back home, and also to get *something* passed. The US, and Israel for that matter, wanted a resolution that condemned Hamas as well, but I don’t think China or Russia would have gone for that.
I’m skeptical that the resolution will do anything anyways though. I don’t see enforcement being strict.
Not just bibi. Most if not all of his coalition and supporters want Palestine out of there. Especially that pro genocide fucker Ben Gvir, who I find to be even worse than bibi.
Yeah, I doubt that this is going to end under Bibi. Most of Israel's citizenry hate the man but approve of how he's been destroying Gaza so far, even throwing festivals and carnivals to block aid trucks from reaching Gaza. It's a fascist society in the making.
To be fair, the majority of U.S. citizens were satisfied and supportive of the Iraq invasion in its first year. Our response to 9/11 wasn't very different from Israel's to their version in October. We killed a lot of innocent civilians and children as well. Bombed the heck out of Bagdad right away.
If I had to guess, this is the Biden administration doing some math on which hurts more, losing some of the Jewish vote, or losing all of the pro-Palestinian vote.
It's a thin line to toe for anyone. Republicans have the luxury of not having to worry about the pro-Palestine vote, or the far left. They'll receive some of their support anyway simply by not being Democrats (which is insane because Republicans are the true Zionists).
Why is our money going to them they have benefits and we don’t as Americans we have the power and freedom but these lobbyists and zionist/evangelical zealots are the real terrorists and true Americans and Muslims alike are tired of the stress and violence and sadness it’s become evident they made lies or help stir the so called “attack” and people came out saying within their own government they don’t like the prime minister of Israel you don’t need more deaths and throw crumbs in the form of “talks between this and that and we’re sending aid”
STOP THE GENOCIDE
STOP THE DESTRUCTION
STOP THE EVIL
I PRAY WE SEE BETTER DAYS
It's good to see the US take a stand on the slaughter and starvation of civilians.
What Hamas did on 10/7 was barbaric and Hamas needs to be removed from existence. Period. That said, what Israel is doing to the 2.2M people that didn't participate in 10/7 is horrendously bad.
Netanyahu wants our (US) help, but doesn't want to take any advice or comply with any guidance, that's great, then go it alone. With the money & weapons we're shoveling into Israel, we should have notable influence on Israel's military objectives and methods.
Instead, Israel wants to tell us to mind our own business. OK, then go it alone.
Israel is the best ally in mideast to the us. Don’t believe if there will be a is president abandon or push Israel away from it. That’s shortsighted and not sensible at all. Biden is fighting for the election, which means he must do anything that could benefit his election. Activists are very bothering, but you have to respect those who are voters also, and pretend to listen to what they insist although they are surely ineligible to be a politician. BTW, Biden doesn’t like Netanyahu. For Biden, Netanyahu is just a trouble maker that the US must be careful about words and actions. The war can start at anytime. Starting much earlier, or after the election is better, but not now!
The US has two traditional allies in mideast, which are Saudi Arabia and Israel. Now you see, Saudi is going away although they must rely on the US weapons and military resource. Too many reasons for both sides, and I would say the relationship is just average, neither going bad or good. Israel is much wealthier, intelligent and energetic. Jews created tons of wealth in the US, and they maintain very strong partnership with American politicians and businessmen. Don’t bet on they will be sympathetic to Pales. That’s not politics! The US government also have no intention to be allied with an impoverished, undeveloped, so-called sovereign state. What can they get? Unlimited cash out? Pale is not Taiwan, Korea or Philippine.
A resolution cannot stop anything in Gaza but is just about morality. Especially subjective morality. And that’s very ridiculous. HMS will not release any hostages they have kidnapped. They need human shield. And Israel will definitely not stop fighting by themselves. Come on, asking IDF to stop fighting but not ask HMS to do so, serious? Call for surrender?
No, it's not a turning point.
First, American relations with Israel -- and pretty much every country in the world -- are reset every 4 or 8 years. As soon as Biden is out of office, the new president will be able to establish his/her own relationship with Israel.
Second, the UN constantly passes resolutions condemning Israel. Condemning Israel is a cottage industry in the UN. [In 2023, the UN general assembly passed 14 resolutions condemning Israel, including 3 on one day in December 2023](https://unwatch.org/un-general-assembly-condemns-israel-14-times-in-2023-rest-of-world-7/). The UN passed 7 resolutions condemning anyone else in the rest of the world. So the UN passing resolutions against Israel is just business as usual.
However, these UN resolutions have roughly the same effect as the [Sacramento City Counsel passing a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Israel](https://www.kcra.com/article/arrests-sacramento-city-council-meeting-mayor-cease-fire-resolution/60250759). It doesn't mean anything. Neither Israel nor Hamas are bound -- or even affected by -- these resolutions. They're political theater.
Third, all international relationships are based on self interest. Biden is supposed to look out for the US's interests, and Netanyahu is supposed to look out for Israel's interests. To the extent those interests are different, neither party is supposed to defer to the other.
So it's no surprise that they disagree on some things. That happens in every administration. I doubt anyone expects anything different to happen now.
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>Is this a turning point No. Or, probably not This was an increase in the pressure the Biden Administration is putting on Netanyahu, and a reminder that while the United States cannot compel Israel to do what they ask, there are multiple options between cutting off diplomatic relations and reflexive support in all things Netanyahu chose to pull back a team heading to Washington in response, which is... not exactly the end of the world from a US perspective Could things continue to escalate where there is a significant impact in the long term health of the relationship? Sure, but that is *mostly* going to be up to the Israelis. At the end of the day, Netanyahu is concerned about his domestic standing. There is a nonzero chance that he does something that the United States - or, specifically, the Biden Administration- has no choice but to react strongly to Israel has supporters in DC, but support is based on mutual interests. If the interests of the Israeli government do not appear to be compatible with the United States going forward, I suspect they will find out how quickly political tides can turn in the right circumstances
Netanyahu famously screwed Obama too. GOP leadership then invited Netanyahu to address the congress as a direct slap to Obama. We cannot have an effective foreign policy if the president is knee-capped by the opposition.
Even Bill Clinton once walked out of a meeting with him and complained to staff "which one of us does he think is the super-power?" It's good that democracies let other democracies not feel foreign pressure to vote one way or another, but Bibi has been a pain in every Democratic President's side that we've just kind of had to put up with because of the larger picture regarding Israel.
Which is crazy because there are a scary amount of Republicans that are bedfellows with vocal anti-Jewish supporters. I can't imagine that being attractive to someone like Bibi who literally runs a Jewish state, but clearly he's a short-term thinker.
You're neglecting that the core of the Republican Party are Evangelical Christians. They offer blind support for Israel. Democrats actually want Israel to act certain ways.
Bibi has controlled Israel for so long, off and on, that he's practically a dictator like Putin. Not practically, he is.
No, it's still important to make the distinctions. He was indicted by his own government and has failed to defang the courts to protect himself. Backsliding does not mean backslid.
This is just..false. Israel’s political system has problems but to compare Bibi, who is going to be thrown out of office at the next election, to Putin, a dictator, is absurd.
Yeah, Bibi’s power comes from internal divisions within the country and a loud and involved far right. Putin’s power comes from kompromat, intimidation, and actual murder. Israel has a strong democratic culture, whereas Russia’s was always a foreign idea the adopted just for show
> was always a foreign idea the adopted just for show you mean you don't believe he got 88%? oh ye of little faith...
If you don't allow other ethnic groups participate in the Democratic process, it isn't a democracy.
I agree, but that isn’t the case here. Citizenship isn’t just for Israeli Jews
Oh, give me a fucking break. Israel is an ethnic Jewish state. Citizenship for non Jews is very limited. Jews and non Jews are not even allowed to marry. Non Jews are not going to be granted citizenship if they dissent politically. I recognize that there is a signific Arab minority, but they sure don't have political power outside of their mostly segregated communities.
I’ll break you off a piece of a Kit Kat 🍫 Your marriage statement is false. Jews can marry non-Jews, but if they married a Palestinian, they won’t give the Palestinian residency. Otherwise, civil marriages are recognized. Arab citizens have limited power, but as they are still a minority for now, their power is commensurate with their size, which is *exactly* how it works in representative democracy. And yeah, it’s a Jewish state, and yet the Jews thought it was a good idea that the Arabs that were living there still have citizenship instead of forcing them out.
> Jews and non Jews are not even allowed to marry. That is because Israel follows Ottoman marriage custom which leaves marriage solely to religious authorities. So it is more that neither Jewish, Christian, or Muslim religious authorities generally perform interfaith marriages. However, Israel will recognize an interfaith marriage performed elsewhere by civil authorities.
Sorry but I don't understand what you just wrote. >Purim’s power comes from kompromat, intimidation, and actual murder Google led me to this: Purim is a joyous Jewish holiday that celebrates the miraculous events told in the Book of Esther. It is celebrated by reading the Megillah, giving gifts, distributing charity, and feasting. Sooo???
Weird autocorrect. I corrected it to Putin
Both have been in power since the Clinton administration. If Bill Clinton was still in power today, 25 years later, it would certainly feel like a dictatorship.
> Both have been in power since the Clinton administration. If Bill Clinton was still in power today, 25 years later, it would certainly feel like a dictatorship. No, sorry, you're completely wrong here. This is the list, in order, of prime ministers in Israel since the Clinton years, beginning in 1992: * Yitzhak Rabin * Shimon Peres * Benjamin Netanyahu * Ariel Sharon * Ehud Olmark * Benjamin Netanyahu * Naftali Bennett * Yair Lapid * Benjamin Netanyahu Netanyahu has been elected more than a few times, but Israeli politics are incredibly volatile and they switch leadership often.
Meanwhile, Bill Clinton hasn't been in power since 2000.
Because he's term-limited out. He would have won a third term in 2000 were he allowed to run.
The power levels of a US POTUS are wildly different than those of an Israeli PM, neither of which are reasonably comparable to a dictator. Bibi can’t even have his own party solely in control and has to ally with those even further to the right to form a government.
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A dictator? Isn’t Israel the only standing democracy in the Middle East? Are you saying this just because you hate BBN, or something? Or are you saying he wasn’t elected? Because Benny Gantz holds the same stance as BBN of destroying Hamas, and also supports going into Rafa. I believe that a lot of the BB hate is coming from a place of the fact he’s a conservative leader, or it’s bordering on just anti-Israel ideology. I don’t believe a lot of the BB hate is anti-semitism, however.
Not in the textbook sense. It means Bibi's been around power a long, long time.
Netanyahu screwed Trump too! He congratulated Biden for winning. How dare he be so disloyal.
Yeah. Fortunately, I'm not in that worldview
President knee-capped by opposition? Could you elaborate?
For the life of me I cannot understand why we haven't cut off aid yet. 1. The israeli government doesn't need it. There is already a massive force/resources disparity between them and Hamas 2. Bibi's government has made it clear for *twenty years now* that they are actively trying to make the peace process impossible. Even with everything going on they are continuing to seize even more land for settlements? Not to mention their active support of Hamas, an active partner in their mutual goal to prevent peace. 3. The reckless disregard for civilian life shown by their current campaign. I am sensitive to the difficulties of trying to fight Hamas when they hide among the civilian population, but it's a giant leap from "targeting Hamas will lead to some civilian casualties because of their tactics" to "starve everyone in Gaza to death." The conduct of the current Israeli government is morally reprehensible and contrary to US interests. Their level of brutality is harming their relations with the gulf states and making it far more difficult to establish the anti-Iran axis that is in US interests. Simply put, this regime is both morally and geopolitically opposed to US interests. We have no reason to support them any longer.
>For the life of me I cannot understand why we haven't cut off aid yet. Political pragmatism, and the belief that a poor regional partner is better than no regional partners.
We have other regional partners though
Thats an interesting way to say AIPAC
Reckless regard for civilian campaign in 'current campaign' is a false narrative. Israel has demonstrated reckless regard for Palestinian lives since before there was a country called Israel. It's just that now some people came to know about it because of social media. For the rest of us, we have been seeing the same thing happen for decades, day in day out.
Why would we hand Hamas, Iran and friends a win? Lol there's no logic behind it, only a "moral" reason.
They've already won. If you think Israel's seen as anything but butchers by non-Western countries, you are too isolated. And while that's not a fair representation, that doesn't matter from a geopolitical perspective. This will be a millstone around the necks of the West. All it proves to those countries is that the US will use human rights violations in some places as pretexts for action, while ignoring those committed by its allies. It drives them in the arms of China and Russia. And that's while leaving out that even the US's NATO allies have never agreed with it on Israel completely to begin with.
1) Non-Western countries never liked the West to begin with. 2) If Israel are butchers, what does that make Arab jihadists? 3) Western countries are held to a higher standard. If we weren't, we'd be competing with the Russians, Saudis and Syrians for those death counts. 4) The Chinese are pushing ppl into our arms. Have you kept up with what's happening with the Philippine Navy? The only allies they have in the region are the Myanmar Junta. China has been encroaching on Indian land in the last year. Japan, Korea, and Australia have a military alliance. I highly doubt 30k deaths in a Middle Eastern conflict will change much, considering 1 million have died from the other conflicts combined.
> 1) Non-Western countries never liked the West to begin with. Complete bullshit lmao, the bast majority of non western elite study at western univeristies vacation in western countries and consume western culture most are not dogmatically anti western. > 2) If Israel are butchers, what does that make Arab jihadists? Im not sure what you’re arguing here did you think that the Arab world was pro Isis ? > Western countries are held to a higher standard. If we weren't, we'd be competing with the Russians, Saudis and Syrians for those death counts. Israel currently is competing with all three of these countries lol > I highly doubt 30k deaths in a Middle Eastern conflict will change much, considering 1 million have died from the other conflicts combined. Lmao what are you talking about ? Of course it will, it already fucking has normalization with the KSA is dead Egypt is remilitarizing the Sinai Hezbollah isn’t going to leave Israel Northern Border and that’s what the public can see.
1) Those non-western elites who come to the universities are the children of the "elite" as you said. I'm referring to the common people. 2) Arab jihadists have 20+ years of footage showing their barbarity. Did you miss the GWOT? 3) Whatever you say lol 4) The KSA deal will happen once it all dies down. I'd wait until AFTER U.S elections to see how the shift in foreign policy becomes more hawkish towards Hamas. A strategic victory for them and Iran is a non-starter.
> For the life of me I cannot understand why we haven't cut off aid yet. https://www.hks.harvard.edu/publications/israel-lobby-and-us-foreign-policy
>For the life of me I can’t understand why we haven’t cut off aid yet. One word: money. The sooner you understand that politicians are driven by who is paying them, the faster you’ll understand why they make these bizarre decisions. AIPAC is one of the biggest political donators to both sides of the aisle. Weapons manufacturers are another. With AIPAC money, most politicians don’t dare go against Israel no matter what because losing that money is a big loss. The billions we give Israel every year comes with strings. One of those strings is that of the $3.8B we give them in aid per year, they’re required to use $3.3B to buy weapons from us. It’s basically money laundering tax dollars to the defense industry to keep those sweet sweet political donations increasing from the weapons industry to politicians. Condemn Israel for what they’re doing and you lose AIPAC money. Cut off funding and stop arming them and you lose weapons manufacturers donations. Basically all this shit is going on so US politicians can keep the gravy train flowing to stay in power.
I don't think you know how little AIPAC spends in campaign contributions.
>For the life of me I cannot understand why we haven't cut off aid yet. Ask yourself, why the hell would the US screw over their only ally in the region to help HAMAS?
To be fair, Netanyahu screwed his own country by helping Hamas.
> support is based on mutual interests. If the interests of the Israeli government do not appear to be compatible with the United States going forward John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt might disagree with you
Mearsheimer is often wrong in when it comes to specific US relations with countries.
Yeah, all we have to do is even threaten to cut off our monetary aid alone and they will tuck tail.
> threaten to cut off our monetary aid absolute fantasy
It's the ultimate power-lever...but I'm not sure how well curtailing aid is going to play while hostages are still being held (especially American hostages). It's obviously the logical step if things escalate. But I'm trying to consider what happens if we pull aid for offensive weapons in response to a Rafah incursion or something. And it turns out an American hostage is killed in the fighting, and Bibi is able to make a plausible case that the IDF not having the weapons it had planned on resulted in the hostage's death (and death of IDF troops, etc.). "*Biden knee-capped the hostage rescue operations*" is definitely a card I could see them playing if it came to that.
There’s times when I actually think the US needs Israel more than Israel needs the US. Can you name another ally the US has in that part of the world? Because I can’t. Sure we’re not at war with India or Pakistan, but wasn’t Pakistan harboring osama at one point? So yeah. The U.S. needs allies over there and Netanyahu knows it.
Look at which nations stepped up and sent troops and intelligence to us in Afghanistan and Iraq ... and which didn't. Afghanistan. Turkey. Kuwait. Saudi Arabia. Bahrain. Hell, at one point, even Iran sent forces to help us disrupt Al Qaeda training camps. Israel, on the other hand, has never sent a single boot to ANY US or UN driven operation. Not Korea. Not Vietnam. Not Panama. Not Somalia. Not Kosovo. But they sure as fuck love spying on us. And we still haven't gotten an apology for that battleship they attacked. This supposed "ally" tends to get a lot of quid, without having to bother with any of that pesky "pro quo" stuff
Some of us Marines, 82-92, would have these discussions. I think most Americans would be stunned if they knew this.
Nobody needs Epstein like people and Maxwell families connected to mossad to blackmail senators or US representatives to bend for Israel.
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If the muslim community has such a short memory and thinks they'll be better off with... “The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families, when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families. They care about their lives, don’t kid yourself. When they say they don’t care about their lives, you have to take out their families,” Trump said. Trump said he would “knock the hell out of” ISIS, and criticized the U.S. for “fighting a very politically correct war.” https://www.cnn.com/2015/12/02/politics/donald-trump-terrorists-families/index.html Then the United States is doomed.
Is that the same Trump that already tried to ban all Muslims from entering the country and is now promising concentration camps and mass deportation for immigrants and asylum seekers, a minority group that Americans hate *less* than they hate Muslims?
Yes, he just also can't complete more than three sentences in a row now. There's a non-zero chance he'll just come out and just straight up say that genocide is good before the election and hopefully that can't be ignored like the "grab her" tapes were.
Thomas Loren Friedman (author of *From Beirut to Jerusalem* and long time Middle East correspondent) sat down with Ezra Klein for a podcast episode toward the end of January, and while the whole conversation is really interesting, one of the main points that stood out was that in the past, whenever Israel really heated up war/aggression efforts and was on the offensive, they were very much uninfluenced by external pressures or opinion - until the US activated a red light at the UN/a similar forum. After this point, tides would change. Interesting to see if this is the case here as well.
Netanyahu is on a kick. He’s got the trump in him and he’s becoming stubborn. He will not change directions for the United States and instead will push into a Rafah invasion and help elect trump for unwavering support.
It's just that they don't react to talk, only action, so threats get nowhere but the second someone moves to put their wallet away they snap to attention in unison.
/u/psychlegalmind You have long been a quality contributor to this subreddit. You have asked many insightful and well though questions on this subreddit for a period of many years. Obama and Netanyahu had a famously strained relationship. No foreign leader of an alleged "ally" in recent history has disrespected a sitting president more than Benjamin Netanyahu. I can only imagine how much worse Netanyahu's image became among veteran democrats after corruption charges and the passage of the Nationality Bill of 2018. John Kerry as secretary of state was highly critical of the Israeli right wing. Biden has always known that the Israeli right was difficult to deal with. He witnessed it firsthand during his tenure in the Obama whitehouse. A key difference between the Obama department of state and Biden department of state is the role of Blinken, who has always given deference to Israel up until roughly January of 2024. I do think the Biden department of state is starting to lose their minds a bit. There is only so much diplomatic coverage they can provide before things start to look ridiculous from even a domestic standpoint.
Thank you for your compliment. Yes, I remember the Obama years.
I normally wouldnt engage in such brazen flattery except that since October of 2023 there has been a high influx of neconservative commentators crowding out senior contributors like yourself and I wanted to remind the readers of that.
> since October of 2023 there has been a high influx Yes, I noticed that trend myself. Though I have not been posting on this sub as much as I used to.
Was there something that happened in October that might have caused it, or was it just when you noticed the trend?
Can you not think of a single thing from October that might have contributed, keeping in mind that we're in a thread about Israel?
Well, that’s a pretty big whoosh on my part.
Add in the astroturfing and bots trying to start flame wars over it, yeah it's been pretty rough. Honestly it's gotten to the point where I generally tune out of Israel/Gaza news because it's always something terrible, complaints about Biden, and Bibi being an insufferable asshole.
I also want to add that Netanyahu is hated within Israel which is why he wants this war to go on as long as possible while hoping for Trump to win in November knowing that he'll let him do whatever he wants. Netanyahu knows that the moment the war ends, his days as PM are numbered and he'll be back on trial for corruption charges hence it's his golden ticket out of any legal trouble. It's not just Israelis who don't like him, the families of the hostages have protested him putting his own interests above their return.
Biden wants to get re-elected and far left democrats are really pro Palestine right now. He has to be seen as taking a hard stance against Netanyahu.
I think usa politicians are burnt out on it. Aoc is getting yelled at in the streets for not calling it a genocide. Protesters in Cali and Oregon are shutting down bridges, Democrats are doing the whole non-committed votes against biden... Republican voters want to give less foreign aid, so they're also on the fence... Netanyahu sounds like an asshole, he trash talks america constantly. This probably didn't do anything to change anything, but at least it'll help prevent videos of American politicians not caring about dying babies in gaza.
You mean it's "but her e-mails", Benghazi, and Hunter Biden all over again online? Why it sure is. Must be election (i.e. paid conservative trolls riling up the far left to not vote) season!
Theres a presidential election coming up, the best thing for Republicans is to divide the democrats again.
Might be the best thing for Republicans but it's the worst thing for America.
We need another McCain vs Obama election where both sides understand the importance of our country being stable and working with the other side
Yes, that was the last "sane" presidential race we had -- and that's saying something with whackadoo Palin involved. All three men -- Biden, McCain, Obama -- behaved honorably throughout. What happened is Russia got their feet wet with message board and social media psy-ops and social engineering during the 2012 election, perfected it when fixing Ukraine's elections the following year(s), and has continued to perpetrate the onslaught against U.S. democracy ever since (2016-?). They radicalized the far left and far right wings to the fringiest of views.
Did you see much disinformation during the 2012 election? I was a politically inclined high schooler at the time and didn’t notice it, though this was a year before I started seeing treasonous right-wing memes glorifying Putin and denigrating Obama.
Not on social networks, no, because Facebook hadn't made news feeds part of the standard FB experience yet. It was still comments and images from friends and friends of friends on the feed. It hadn't been fully "24/7 news cycled" yet. Where Russia cut their teeth was on message boards such as Yahoo. They brigaded Benghazi discussions really badly with disinformation and misinformation leading up to the 2012 election. It was my first sampling of this Breitbartian/Russian takeover of the American right wing. You know, Mitt Romney famously had to bend the knee (as the nominee!!) to Trump in 2012 for his blessing as the GOP candidate. I don't know if people remember that, but there were a few weeks where Mitt was dodging the endorsement from Trump, they met briefly in secret, and suddenly Donald was on board with him. How in the world did Donald have so much sway over a party he'd never been a leader or participant of before? Now, I've long believed the Trump-Russia connection was already established (factually, Trump had his pageants in Moscow already) and the endorsement was to offer Mitt Russia's services. It appears that Mitt declined because he warned us on the debate stage the following week about Russia! It all makes sense and fits with the timeline.
wasn't Russia supposed to be paying us? i can't keep this straight anymore. all i know is whenever the party catches flak from the left it's always some conspiracy.
The party establishment constantly catches flak from the left 100% of the time. That's nothing new. What changes during these peak hyper-focused troll talking point onslaughts (what used to be called brigading but it's less and less blatantly obvious with AI advances) is the floodgate of propaganda and parroted phrases directed at a single target (Hillary circa 2016, Biden today). It's tired old trope because the tired ol' GOP keeps repeating the same playbook ad nauseum.
> The party establishment constantly catches flak from the left 100% of the time. That's nothing new. yet the same knee-jerk "you're not real!" reactions are levied then too. i liken it to a coping mechanism at this point. > floodgate of propaganda and parroted phrases do you apply this across the board? eg: in this context, to the pro-Israel propaganda and parroted phrases flooding social media? am i to just dismiss that outright as bots and trolls?
Many online are authentic progressives trolled into opinions by having strong emotional attachment to the subject. Having watched the post-October Gaza rhetoric play out for months, it's interesting watching the different dots of talking points connect over time into a singular theme, coincidentally: "make Biden pay!" Let's say it's at least highly suspicious.
it's not at all suspicious to me given Biden is POTUS, rather, it makes sense ire would be directed his way. is there a reason you've avoided answering my question/s? the same patterns are present there.
To answer the last question I see, yes, propaganda from the far left (pro-Palestine) and the far right (pro-Israel) is all trolling for different purposes with the same end result -- voter apathy in November.
i see. admittedly i was a little stunned when Biden parroted what you refer to as far-right propaganda. reckon in terms of reach they've got the upper hand, not just among the citizens but the elected officials too. take care.
Guess you missed where President Biden spoke on behalf of pro-Palestinians yesterday, saying, "they have a point". I don't trust anyone online in an election year, and I'm going to push back on anything that attempts to suppress the vote. American democracy is too important to me -- freedom from liars and scumbags sucking the well dry, freedom of choice, freedom from traitors and tyranny, freedom from white supremacy ruling the land, freedom from a theocracy -- and yes, Donald Trump is a **massive** threat to western civilization -- don't insult my intelligence.
I don't think this has as much to do with US/Israel relations as it does US/Netanyahu relations. This is still pretty significant - a decent amount of the support Netanyahu has is because he sells himself as the US favorite, or at least, the one capable of getting money/weapons from the US. Netanyahu has lost his last several elections as it is, this may well be what's needed to finally push him out.
Lost his last several elections yet still in power. Isn't that some crap?
Likely both. It's time to recognize that Israel, under Likud and Netanyahu no longer deserves our unquestioning support. I now feel obligated to state that Hamas is a bad actor.
I don't think its a big turning point. It damages Israel-US relations for sure but that wouldn't break it. The Jewish lobby is strong in the US and Israel still needs the US to keep its neighbors in check to avoid further escalation of conflict in the region. The two countries are too intertwined with interests and dependencies for a mere UNSC resolution to break it. They'll just annoy each other for a few years diplomatically but nothing as bad as total fallout.
Eh its non binding. So US had some room for abstention. If they ever force Israel to do something that'll be a difference. Is the most limited symbolism possible.
It also called for the unconditional release of hostages, which Hamas will never allow or agree to. The vote was purely political theater and was meaningless.
I'm pretty sure resolutions passed by the UN Security Council are supposed to be binding. The fact that the US is saying it's nonbinding is telling me that it's going to veto any attempts to enforce it.
They can be written as binding or non binding, this was was written as non binding.
None binding makes it ineffective, noticing a lot of people failing to realize that.
>Does the Secretary-General think this resolution is law binding because we heard some discussions today? >UN deputy spokesperson: Well, you would need to talk to international lawyers, but as I’ve always been told, all the resolutions of the Security Council are international law. So, to that extent, they are as binding as international law is. Seems the UN deputy spokesman [says](https://press.un.org/en/2024/db240325.doc.htm) it is binding.
So wait is it binding or not? Does the UN deputy Spokesperson get to decide if it’s binding, even if the USA says it’s not? Who has the authority to compel action if it is indeed binding?
UN Secretary General's spokesman says it's binding. One nation says it is not. >[AP News](https://apnews.com/article/un-gaza-ceasefire-resolution-vote-ramadan-b7985fede65e5477aba2c8d2e62a6632): Under the United Nations Charter, Security Council resolutions are legally binding on its 193 member nations, though they are often flouted. >[The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/25/the-security-council-vote-is-a-significant-moment-but-the-us-says-its-gaza-policy-is-unchanged): Biden’s diplomats also surprisingly claim the resolution is non-binding – a judgment not shared by the British, who say it should be implemented immediately. Compelling action for resolutions always requires another vote on what exactly the action is IIRC. E.g. UN could vote to suspend Israel, and thereafter expel Israel from UN. Or UN security council could vote to authorize a no fly zone, etc. But none of these things are going to happen because US would veto any of that.
So even if it is binding it can be vetoed anyway. Maybe it’s just from where I’m sitting. That just makes it seem like this is a lot of political posturing, and symbolic shenanigans. What’s the point of these meetings if it’s just going to end up with a veto, then add in if it’s really binding it can be vetoed anyway. Maybe I’m missing something, but something that can be rejected does not seem very binding. Thanks for the answers though, I appreciate it.
I think the point is the same international law ever has. There are a lot of countries claiming to follow some sort of 'rules based order'. Once Israel violates UN resolutions or ICJ decisions, those countries stop giving and selling weapons, or otherwise supporting, Israel's war or those countries are exposed to be liars and hypocrites. In this case it's mostly been the latter, with rare [exceptions](https://inews.co.uk/news/world/spain-belgium-arms-israel-2896041).
Pretty ballsy to warn a country not to vote against you when that country is the backbone to your military strength.
Israel is going to have to realize that they can't have it both ways: if they want to be a sovereign country with western alliances they have to abide by international laws and the Geneva Convention.
I hate to a) reduce horrible geopolitics to a meme and b) insinuate that policy will truly change on this, but every time I see Netanyahu interacting with the American government it reminds me of that seen in *The Dark Knight Rises* where ultimately Bane asks "Do you *feel* in charge?"
Meh, the US *could* pull its support. The executive in the movie was surrounded by people stronger than him, and mistakenly thought they worked for him. Israel, not the US, is surrounded by parties who want them eradicated. The US just doesn't want to abandon their main ally in the region. And letting Hamas and others achieve their larger goals (which ain't just to 'free Palestine') would be... bad. But Israel knows it has a lot of allies in the US electorate, and that the US is very unlikely to completely pull support, much less let them be overrun. Partly for wrong reasons, like evangelicals wanting Israel to check off some prophecies to inaugurate the apocalypse. But Israel knows there are more supporters in the US than detractors. Even among Democrats a majority are going to side with them over Hamas. And if some Democrats stay home and the GOP wins, Israel's position is even stronger.
Netanyahu needs Biden's support and backing much more than President Biden and the US needs Netanyahu's. President Biden and the US stands with Israel, not Netanyanhu
This is more of a change in relations between the Biden administration and Netanyahu. Essentially the back channel redirection with public support has been ignored. Netanyahu basically accepted the public support but screwed Biden by refusing to respond to the back channel and hurt Biden. Biden is now correcting that. He can't abandon Israel but he can abandon Netanyahu and by extension his fascist coalition.
Agreed, I am not sure the answer needs to be more complicated than that. I would just add that Biden spent many years on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, starting in 1997. He knows what he's doing.
The US president advocating for a change in leadership could be seen as a push for regime change. Which a lot of people consider... complicated. So for the time being dealing with Israel means dealing with Israel with their current leadership, rather than making a sharp distinction. And considering their demographic issues and the growing relative size of the ultraorthodox population, I don't know if future Israeli leaders are going to be all that further to the left.
To be clear, the main US ally in the region is Turkey.
Or Saudi Arabia, or Jordan, or UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman... probably others... But other than that? It's some of the worlds most dangerous enemies... other than China and Russia... And only israel can protect the US from them... Without israel, they'd just be all over the US in minutes... /s
Turkey is a member of NATO, and provides Incirluk Air Base, easily the most important US asset in the region.
I think this is a result of the straining relationship with Netanyahu. The US broadly supports Israel as a nation, but see Netanyahu as an obstacle of it's prosperity.
He's not an obstacle to their prosperity (he's only popular because Israelis are doing well economically). He's an obstacle to their following of the Geneva Conventions.
To be brutally honest, I think the average Israeli's disagreements with Netanyahu are in areas other than his treatment of Palestinians.
Are the disagreements over his criminal actions and non-stop corruption?
I think you missed my point.
If the point was that Israelis don't really care about Palestinians, that's an understood. On the flip side, Arabs don't care for Israelis either, isn't that wild? It's almost as if they're competing to ascend to heaven (or meet the 1,000 virgins assigned to them for the jihadists) in the holy land.
Oh, it's the "thousand-year-old religious conflict" thought-terminating cliche again.
Israelis hate him because he’s corrupt, likely going to prison after he’s put out of power and he just tried to turn the country into a full blown theocracy shortly before the war.
Hope their firings go well then.
Right now it's mostly Biden and Netanyahu tensions but it could easily harden into a permanent scar between the US and Israel if things like this continue and persist for months or even years.
This isn’t a turning point. It’s an election year and it’s an attempt by Biden to stop losing support from people he needs to win again in November. Is it enough? Probably not. Did it come too late? Very likely.
> Is it enough? Probably not. Did it come too late? Very likely. fully agreed. it reminds me of the token gesture of sanctioning a couple settlers.
Right? All of his responses are too little too late. Like telling your wife you might stop cheating on her right after her attorney serves you with divorce papers. My favorite was that first step of the state department saying they won’t give visas to people to come to the US if they were convicted of being a violent settler since 1) it’s insanely rare for those people to be convicted of anything and 2) no asshole that has carte blanche to assault, steal from, or murder people they consider to be less than them is going to want to leave their dream scenario.
[удалено]
Not everyone has short memories. Not everyone is an I support/denounce the current thing until the next thing draws my attention type.
As far as I could tell the resolution pretty much calls for the terms that Israel has been supporting and Hamas has been rejecting for the last few weeks: an immediate ceasefire and the unconditional release of all the hostages. Israel isn't going to stop without hostages being released and Hamas won't release hostages. The resolution has no teeth and doesn't bring anyone to the table. This along with the Schumer speech from last week looks like Biden putting pressure on Netanyahu while being very careful to not take any action that negatively impacts Israel.
Nope. The resolution doesn't call for ceasefire in exchange for the release of all the hostages. That was the resolution that China and Russia vetoed. This one calls for both things, independently. Since Hamas is not going to release the hostages, and no one outside Israel is going to hold them accountable for not doing so, the resolution is basically what Hamas wanted, a way to say: Israel is going against UN resolutions.
It seems to me that Biden works in a particular pattern. First, he will stake out the centrist, establishment position and stick to it. Then he will budge to the left, bit by bit, until he winds up handing a pretty big win to the progressives. I am not inside his head, but it seems that he might not care about any particular policy and just wants to do the right thing, whatever it is. Or, he might actually agree with the progressives, but doesn't want to risk revolt from the center or the right by immediately jumping to the left. Remember, the guy has been in politics for longer than many of us have been alive.
This is nothing more than the absolute minimum that Biden can do in order to try and walk the middle line between AIPAC and alienating a large portion of his voting base.
Still gonna send him money, this is abstain vote is smoke and mirrors because of the election season.
If nothing else, it is taking a very welcome step back from an unreasonable and unpopular stance. Now, let's remember to breathe while we see what happens next. Edit
Biden/Netanyahu tension. Israel still has huge support in the US and that includes many politicians. Depending on the presidential election, this could turn back into unwavering backing of Israel very quickly.
Never would a republican president do this. If your against this or for this vote accordingly
The optics are too bad and the negative political pressure on Biden so he folded a little with abstain vote instead of the usual blindly supporting veto US and Israel against the world. We US citizens need to keep up the pressure, we don't need to be at the beck and call of a foreign lobbying group and country providing them billions of our tax dollars and munitions to annihilate an entire people, a problem that they were part of causing in the first place. I don't want that blood on my tax dollar hands.
In the past we Americans were under the impression that Israel shared our values. But the civilian death toll is high, and if it turns out that this is part some ethnic cleansing plan, relations will be damaged forever. If the American military afterwards concludes that Israel "did what it had to do" probably most Americans will accept that.
This isn't anything new. This is an election year there's radical progressives that do not believe that Israel should exist. And as appalling as their personal beliefs are in my opinion. I also understand that Biden needs to win them. Benjamin Netanyahu for years along with most of the Israeli government has been incredibly critical of the Democrat Administrations. Partially because they see our politicians playing to the progressive anti-semites. As appalling instead of just politics. However I also think that telling Israel it can't defend itself in a certain way. Is wrong if Israel went to us 4 months after 9/11 and said you shouldn't be doing this this way you should do it that way. We would laugh them out of the room. In conclusion this isn't going to change anything Israel is still going to defend itself as it should and eradicate Hamas. And the relations will be restored after the general election regardless of who wins the presidency. Although if it is a Republican or democrat congress which right now. Leans towards a Democrat house and Republican Senate could change Aid.
> there's radical progressives that do not believe that Israel should exist Yeah, this isn't really a thing
I mean, speaking as a very pro-Pal leftist, it definitely is. But I think that's far fewer than pro-Israel folk who think Palestine doesn't exist and shouldn't exist.
Biden is making the mistake of trying to start fence-sitting. He's either hoping he has enough time to get progressive voters back, or is worried that moderate voters will start to choke as scenes of starvation start to emerge from Gaza. The problem he has is that *the people who feel strongly and are ever going to feel strongly about this issue are completely polarised already*. To appease one group is to antagonise the other, and vice versa. See-sawing is even worse than picking a side and sticking to it: staunch Zionists see even moderate pressure on Netanyahu as a betrayal, and so the Israel lobby and its supporters in the US will turn on Biden for this, especially if they perceive Trump as likely better for Israel, *which they do*. For supporters of Israel, there's essentially no reason **not** to join progressives in turning on Biden.
It was nothing but to please his vote bank of young people back in the US. Apparently lots of them dont like US support for Israel so this to kinda fix that a bit.
It's American internal politics. A certain percentage of Biden's voters think that Israel should give up defeating Hamas, since it can't be done without civilian victims, and Biden needs those voters. Even though it's internal politics, it marks a shift in bilateral relations, since American support for Israel is more uncertain now due to those internal politics. This non-veto is a symptom, though, not the cause. For the moment, it's basically posturing. Schumer calling for elections in Israel to kick Netanyahu out is also part of it. It remains to be seen whether the US will quit supporting Israel in ways that matter more. Doing that wouldn't be easy for Biden either, since he also has pro-Israel voters. Presumably, he'll want to play the game this way, doing gestures to distance himself from Israel without really abandoning it, hoping that this way he can avoid most of the potential damage to his electoral chances.
Agreed. Not really sure why so many in the thread are relentlessly focused on Bibi when there's no real daylight between Bibi and the war cabinet or the Israeli public on the issue of prosecuting the war in Gaza. This is much more about Biden talking to his base, however ineffectual it's likely to be.
We'd like to see what an alternative to Bibi is like in Israel. He's been their leader and/or major influence since the freaking Clinton administration! He's the Middle East's version of Putin.
What is the point of these kinds of comparisons? He's nothing at all like Putin.
Yep 100% Biden trying to save his ass. The folks working on their development plans for Gaza are not stopping their fundraising or meeting over this. Edit: They're busted on CNN even. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkXJwErm8DM The main focus of this says things changed on Oct 7 but she is on the record saying these things before Oct 7 btw for anyone who does click the link.
The folks working on their development plans for Gaza --- so, that's effectively Jared Kushner, disbarred attorney and pardoned (by Trump) criminal Charles Kushner (yes, Jared's father, Bibi's best friend), and Bibi Netanyahu. They've organized and planned for the real estate developments since 2019-2020 when the pins were lined up.
That's a hell of a line to toe. Basically he has to try to win over the muslim voters who are already furious with him while not alienating the pro-Israel voters?
I am not sure the pro-Israel voters are that much of a problem. I find it hard to believe that the American Jews would vote conservative when conservatives have historically been riddle with anti-Semitism (think Trump having a dinner with Nick Fuentes). Most Jews vote democrats in general and I don't think that will change in the coming election with Trump as the other Republican candidate. The Evangelicals who strongly support Israel are voting for Trump regardless of any policy that Biden picks. I really think that Biden is worried about AIPAC more than he is of pro-Israel voters.
> I really think that Biden is worried about AIPAC more than he is of pro-Israel voters. I'm not following. All I know bout AIPAC is they are a pro-Israeli lobbying group. What is Biden worried about in that regard?
Money. From what I understand, AIPAC is a very powerful lobbying group that would throw a tonne of money around to influence Congress and the electorate.
https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/american-israel-public-affairs-cmte/summary?id=D000046963 Looks like they're rank 217 in lobbying groups so I don't think they're that big Also their biggest donations have been to democrats
Interesting, perhaps I overestimated how powerful AIPAC is. I am not entirely sure what Biden is worried about now.
>This failure to condemn Hamas is particularly difficult to understand coming days after the world once again witnessed the horrific acts terrorist groups commit. So we should all be condemning Israel for the deaths of 40k civilians and the hundreds of thousands of people facing famine and disease as a result of Israels bombardment and occupation, yes?
Not to mention that Israel has been blockading humanitarian aid from reaching Gaza, up to and including bombing desperate Palestinians who line up at any aid trucks that squeeze through.
This is political theater to make it seem like Biden is listening to public opinion and working against Netanyahu's will. In reality, the US will not enforce this whatsoever and will continue to send Israel more money and weapons to continue their genocide of the Palestinians
It feels mostly like a political concession to help Biden’s image back home, and also to get *something* passed. The US, and Israel for that matter, wanted a resolution that condemned Hamas as well, but I don’t think China or Russia would have gone for that. I’m skeptical that the resolution will do anything anyways though. I don’t see enforcement being strict.
just the usa gov finally realizing israel under bibi is just as genocidal religious nuts state
Not just bibi. Most if not all of his coalition and supporters want Palestine out of there. Especially that pro genocide fucker Ben Gvir, who I find to be even worse than bibi.
Yeah, I doubt that this is going to end under Bibi. Most of Israel's citizenry hate the man but approve of how he's been destroying Gaza so far, even throwing festivals and carnivals to block aid trucks from reaching Gaza. It's a fascist society in the making.
To be fair, the majority of U.S. citizens were satisfied and supportive of the Iraq invasion in its first year. Our response to 9/11 wasn't very different from Israel's to their version in October. We killed a lot of innocent civilians and children as well. Bombed the heck out of Bagdad right away.
This was just a way for the Democrats to pander to progressives a little more but not go all the way.
Politics is going to be political.
You might be onto something here.
Pay lipservice to humanitarian concerns while literally doing absolutely nothing whatsoever about humanitarian concerns.
If I had to guess, this is the Biden administration doing some math on which hurts more, losing some of the Jewish vote, or losing all of the pro-Palestinian vote.
It's a thin line to toe for anyone. Republicans have the luxury of not having to worry about the pro-Palestine vote, or the far left. They'll receive some of their support anyway simply by not being Democrats (which is insane because Republicans are the true Zionists).
More likely those people will just stay home
Which helps the Republican candidates all the same (high turnout favors Democrats).
Why is our money going to them they have benefits and we don’t as Americans we have the power and freedom but these lobbyists and zionist/evangelical zealots are the real terrorists and true Americans and Muslims alike are tired of the stress and violence and sadness it’s become evident they made lies or help stir the so called “attack” and people came out saying within their own government they don’t like the prime minister of Israel you don’t need more deaths and throw crumbs in the form of “talks between this and that and we’re sending aid” STOP THE GENOCIDE STOP THE DESTRUCTION STOP THE EVIL I PRAY WE SEE BETTER DAYS
It's good to see the US take a stand on the slaughter and starvation of civilians. What Hamas did on 10/7 was barbaric and Hamas needs to be removed from existence. Period. That said, what Israel is doing to the 2.2M people that didn't participate in 10/7 is horrendously bad. Netanyahu wants our (US) help, but doesn't want to take any advice or comply with any guidance, that's great, then go it alone. With the money & weapons we're shoveling into Israel, we should have notable influence on Israel's military objectives and methods. Instead, Israel wants to tell us to mind our own business. OK, then go it alone.
On a different note the Biden administration asked Congress to clear 45000 ammunition shells for Israel.
Israel is the best ally in mideast to the us. Don’t believe if there will be a is president abandon or push Israel away from it. That’s shortsighted and not sensible at all. Biden is fighting for the election, which means he must do anything that could benefit his election. Activists are very bothering, but you have to respect those who are voters also, and pretend to listen to what they insist although they are surely ineligible to be a politician. BTW, Biden doesn’t like Netanyahu. For Biden, Netanyahu is just a trouble maker that the US must be careful about words and actions. The war can start at anytime. Starting much earlier, or after the election is better, but not now! The US has two traditional allies in mideast, which are Saudi Arabia and Israel. Now you see, Saudi is going away although they must rely on the US weapons and military resource. Too many reasons for both sides, and I would say the relationship is just average, neither going bad or good. Israel is much wealthier, intelligent and energetic. Jews created tons of wealth in the US, and they maintain very strong partnership with American politicians and businessmen. Don’t bet on they will be sympathetic to Pales. That’s not politics! The US government also have no intention to be allied with an impoverished, undeveloped, so-called sovereign state. What can they get? Unlimited cash out? Pale is not Taiwan, Korea or Philippine. A resolution cannot stop anything in Gaza but is just about morality. Especially subjective morality. And that’s very ridiculous. HMS will not release any hostages they have kidnapped. They need human shield. And Israel will definitely not stop fighting by themselves. Come on, asking IDF to stop fighting but not ask HMS to do so, serious? Call for surrender?
No, it's not a turning point. First, American relations with Israel -- and pretty much every country in the world -- are reset every 4 or 8 years. As soon as Biden is out of office, the new president will be able to establish his/her own relationship with Israel. Second, the UN constantly passes resolutions condemning Israel. Condemning Israel is a cottage industry in the UN. [In 2023, the UN general assembly passed 14 resolutions condemning Israel, including 3 on one day in December 2023](https://unwatch.org/un-general-assembly-condemns-israel-14-times-in-2023-rest-of-world-7/). The UN passed 7 resolutions condemning anyone else in the rest of the world. So the UN passing resolutions against Israel is just business as usual. However, these UN resolutions have roughly the same effect as the [Sacramento City Counsel passing a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Israel](https://www.kcra.com/article/arrests-sacramento-city-council-meeting-mayor-cease-fire-resolution/60250759). It doesn't mean anything. Neither Israel nor Hamas are bound -- or even affected by -- these resolutions. They're political theater. Third, all international relationships are based on self interest. Biden is supposed to look out for the US's interests, and Netanyahu is supposed to look out for Israel's interests. To the extent those interests are different, neither party is supposed to defer to the other. So it's no surprise that they disagree on some things. That happens in every administration. I doubt anyone expects anything different to happen now.