There’s one thing Joe Biden should have understood before he boarded Air Force One for Tel-Aviv.
Benjamin Netanyahu wants Donald Trump back in the White House.
Didn’t Joe see the billboards on his way in from the airport? Or were they taken down?
Benjamin Netanyahu is the Donald Trump of Israel. No doubt about that. Their similarities don’t end with indictments. Both will go anywhere, say anything, do anything, to stay in power. Both assembled hard right coalitions grounded in their own strongman personae and anchored by religious fanatics.
Bibi has been quick to embrace not only the militant Kahanist Jews, but the braying Christian nationalists that constitute so much of Trump’s base.
“You know the town of Bethlehem? Yes. You have a connection to it. We all do. And among other things, we have a connection to King David, the history of Ruth as you know, but also the story of Jesus. Now, Bethlehem had when we handed it over to the Palestinian Authority a Christian population of roughly 80%. Now it's about 20%. And that change happened because in the Palestinian Authority areas, as well as throughout the Middle East, Christians are being constricted, they're being pressured, also they're being persecuted,”
https://www.youtube.com/live/Jc-eZMNnDtw?si=jWNkyBYzqOt5GANj&t=564
If there’s anything white Christian evangelicals love to hear, it’s that they’re being persecuted. The Christians see Israel’s theocratic, apartheid, ethnonationalist state and they drool, particularly since Jesus Christ is scheduled to drop down there for the Last Judgement any minute now.
Well before October 7th, visions of brazenness danced in Trump’s head.
If Republicans win back the Senate next year, and Trump regains the White House, one can imagine whom he might install as attorney general. Jim Jordan is already chair of the House Judiciary Committee. Trump may be far from locking up the nomination, but he can take heart from Netanyahu’s brazenness. Trump’s enablers in the Republican Party (Fox News, and so forth) jumped to condemn his indictment as just another gambit by the liberal elite and “woke” Deep State. Trump is already promising presidential pardons for (and essentially singing along with) extremists who stormed the Capitol.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/04/06/trump-netanyahu-playbook-00090445
And then came Hamas’ horrific atrocities. Israel went into immediate war-footing and began the brutal collective punishment of the people of Gaza.
Biden immediately hopped on Air Force One, flew to Tel-Aviv, and delivered Bibi the warmest of warmest, the tightest of tightest hug.
No matter how it was intended (Joe is big on empathy), that hug became the embrace seen ‘round the world, a trope for American complicity in Israel’s crimes against humanity.
American ordinance blasted Gaza. Biden promised an additional 13.4 billion dollars in military aid. He repeatedly uttered false claims about beheaded Israeli babies when children by the hundreds were being incinerated by American ordinance.
Over the past two months, the images out of Gaza have been horrific -- appalling -- except in the US where they are largely absent from the corporate media. Broken bodies of children flood the airwaves making it impossible to look away. All over the world, millions have reacted with righteous condemnation. Like it or not, the US is longer be seen as an honest broker in any sort of peace process.
Now, the wheels are beginning to come off the rails. In the latest General Assembly resolution demanding a humanitarian cease-fire, 120 nations voted in for 10 voted against. The US and Israel were supported in opposition by only eight countries – Micronesia and Nauru being two of them. But most telling were the 45 abstentions that included almost all of America’s traditional allies. Even the staunch ones, like Germany and Britain are squirming.
The American public is at long last being exposed to the shameful suffering and utter futility of the war. Finally, American journalists are crossing in. Clarissa Ward’s CNN report is devastating.
More reportage is making its way into outlets like the Washington Post.
Americans are asking What is the endgame?. They are not getting a response from their president. Netanyahu wants to obliterate Gaza.
Today’s headlines focused on the IDF’s accidental massacre of three Israeli hostages carrying a white flag. The fog of war. Shit happens. Crowds of Israelis mass in Tel-Aviv. Netanyahu’s wartime coalition is rupturing.
Biden’s initial empathy is now linked, indelibly to Bibi’s continuing malice. The hugger misjudged the hugee. Way too late in the game, the American Commander is trying to turn the aircraft carrier around. Polemics coming from Washington are changing. Now, Biden condemns “indiscriminate bombing”. Now, Blinken and Sullivan dash off to the Middle East to try to restrain the unrestrainable.
On the other hand, US polices are not changing. Unrestricted American military aid still flows. Israel’s arsenals are being topped up by American defense contractors – as always.
Benjamin Netanyahu is in no mood to compromise. He’s bet the farm on this war. He needs it to stay in power. If he loses, he’s facing disgrace, trial, and probable hard time. He could care less about international law or Palestinian children.
Clearly, it is becoming strategically advantageous for Netanyahu to rebuke Biden and play his bloody hand to the bitter end. That means continuing the ceaseless, murderous IDF attacks (18,000 and counting), rejecting the pipe dream of a two state solution outright, and strengthening political support on his right flank.
Beleaguered Biden’s support within his own Democratic base, continues to frazzle. Muslims, progressives, young voters are walking away. Top aides are quitting. His linkage of aid to Israel with aid to Ukraine is backfiring. Joe’s getting the middle finger from Congress.
It will soon be the moment for the treacherous Israeli Prime Minister to extend his middle finger – to paint himself as the Churchillian leader with the guts to stand up to the US.
Netanyahu has the power to do real political damage to Biden – huggermugger.
It’s may soon be Bibi who has Joe in his bear-hug. And what can Joe do? Can he deny military aid to Israel? Can he withdraw the US Security Council veto? Can he vigorously condemn Israel’s genocidal war crimes?
That may be risking political suicide, but it might be the only way out. Perhaps a hard pushaway from that initial clinch is Biden’s best defense. The Israeli PM is a fascist bastard. Like Donald Trump, he doesn’t submit to nice.
By making Biden look weak and ineffectual, by exploiting the wedge issue of support for Israel in a polarized America, and by cultivating allies in the AIPAC dominated Democratic and Republican Parties -- the likes of John Fetterman, Chuck Schumer, Mike Johnson, Elise Stefanik -- Bibi has real power to influence the 2024 elections. He wants Trump back in the White House. No doubt about that. He wants a compliant US congress with meddlesome voices like Rashida Talib and the Squad silenced.
Time for another hug Benji? Jerusalem or Mar-a-Lago?
Diogenes Candle
17 December 2023