Biden, along with practically the entire House and Senate, supported the Bush letter saying Israel would retain parts of the West Bank

In April 2004, President Bush sent a letter to Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon supporting Israel's withdrawal from Gaza - but with a crucial addition that Sharon sought.

The letter said, "As part of a final peace settlement, Israel must have secure and recognized borders, which should emerge from negotiations between the parties in accordance with UNSC Resolutions 242 and 338. In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949, and all previous efforts to negotiate a two-state solution have reached the same conclusion. It is realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities."

Two months later, the House and Senate voted overwhelmingly to support that position. The Senate resolution 393 said:

Whereas, in light of realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli population centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949, but realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities;

The House resolution H.Con.Res.460 was largely the same.

Among the 95 senators and 407 representatives who voted for this resolution was Joe Biden.

Everyone who looks at the situation with clear eyes knows that it is out of the question that Israel would ever move back to the 1949 armistice lines. 

Yet the US contradicts that every day by treating the entire area of Judea and Samaria as presumed to be belonging to Palestinians. Joe Biden's angry reaction to the announcement that Israel would build additional units in Ramat Shlomo in 2010 is just one example - no one could possibly think that Ramat Shlomo would ever be part of a Palestinian state. We see the same absurdity today in American policy.

So is the Bush letter - and its confirmation by the overwhelming majority of Congress - just a joke? Should Israel not trust what the US has to say? Or, more specifically, the US government makes a solemn promise, should Israel assume that a later less-friendly administration will not adhere to those promises?

And should we not insist that President Biden keep his own promises?

(h/t Mitchell)

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