Caroline Glick: The strategic fallout of Biden’s failure
States that support Palestinian-centric diplomacy include Jordan and Qatar, and of course also the Palestinian Authority also supports it. All of these are harsh opponents of the Abraham Accords. Indeed, they condemned them. Jordan does not view Iran as a threat. Hamas and to a degree the Palestinian Authority view Iran as a sponsor and ally. And Qatar is Iran’s close ally and partner.Gil Troy: Biden actually did a good job in Israel
All the same, the Biden administration’s policy is to bring the two sides together. The first sign of this came with Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s visit to Israel and the Palestinian Authority in March. At the time, Blinken tried to force the foreign ministers of the Abraham Accord nations to bring the Palestinians into their deliberations. He failed.
But rather than walk away, the administration has doubled down. They have sought to bring Iranian allies and proxies Qatar and Iraq, as well as Jordan, into the regional air defense alliance that the United States seeks to create through CENTCOM. But bringing Qatar and Iraq into the alliance means emptying the alliance of all meaning. Similarly, Biden seeks to bring Jordan and the P.A., which oppose the Abraham Accords, into the summits of Abraham Accord partners, a move that would, again, gut the accords and reduce them to strategic incoherence, at best.
Immediately after Biden left Jeddah empty-handed, Egypt and the UAE beat a path to Tehran’s door looking to reopen their embassies and formally reinstate relations with a state pledged to their destruction. With the U.S. effectively batting for Iran’s team, they need to explore their options.
All of this, of course, is devastating for Israel, on every level. The move Israel has to make is fairly obvious. Israel needs to pander to the Biden administration just as emptily as Biden and his hostile advisers pander to Israel. And then they need to pursue policies that actually defend Israel’s interests.
Unfortunately, our caretaker leaders, Prime Minister Yair Lapid and Defense Minister Benny Gantz, are doing no such thing.
For reasons that have nothing to do with strategic rationality or reality, both men are apparently operating under the impression that Israel is required to advance policies towards the Palestinians and Iran that are devastating to Israel’s existential security interests.
Israel has apparently no plan to attack Iran’s nuclear installations, despite the fact that we are at crunch time. We have no policy to defend or preserve the Abraham Accords. Indeed, both Gantz and Lapid seem to have no clear understanding of the accords’ purpose or rationale. It’s hard to know whether their positions are based on ideological blindness or simple incompetence. Both men have demonstrated both, and in similar ways.
But all the same, Biden’s cataclysmically failed visit, which was followed immediately by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s triumphant visit to Tehran on Monday, means that Israel has no time for its leaders to learn remedial statecraft.
Biden’s pandering was irritating and insulting. But it’s the devastating substance of his policies that is truly alarming. Israel has to stand up for itself now, because nothing it says, no pandering on its part, will change America’s trajectory.
Admittedly, I would have preferred to see unanimity between Israel and Biden. I toast Biden’s growing awareness regarding the dangers of Iran’s sick quest for nukes and its evil Revolutionary Guards, yet I cringed when Biden’s staff removed Israel’s flag from his limousine before entering east Jerusalem. (As a presidential historian, I deem this an unnecessary error: the limousine should fly only two flags everywhere – America’s and the president’s seal.)Biden Administration Funds Anti-Israel Curricula, Hate Messages
Nevertheless, these minor frictions reinforced the broader message of a friendship resilient enough to absorb policy differences.
HERE IS where Biden’s age is a factor – for the good. Born in 1942 to pious, patriotic Catholics, Biden grew up understanding that, as he said, “the ancient roots of the Jewish people [in Israel] date back to biblical times,” and the once homeless Jews deserve a national home. Biden’s sympathy for Zionism contrasts with the Israel-bashers, both Jewish and non-Jewish, who echo today’s trendy vocabulary of delegitimization, sloppily and cruelly applying a critique of Western imperialism to Jews’ unique story.
Biden’s pro-Zionism contrasts with woke extremists like the Democratic member of Congress, Cori Bush, who on Saturday attended a fundraiser organized by Neveen Ayesh. The government relations coordinator for the St. Louis chapter of American Muslims for Palestine, Ayesh has tweeted out filth saying “I tried befriending a Jew once. Worst idea ever” and “I want to set Israel on fire with my own hands & watch it burn to ashes along with every Israeli in it.”
But Biden’s mature example also resists the silliness of Peace Now, which hung a huge poster in Tel Aviv proclaiming – in Hebrew – “welcome to the two states we love the most.” As the election campaign intensifies, and people wonder why Israel’s Left lacks credibility, remember that sign.
Beyond the obvious facts that Biden doesn’t speak Hebrew and the “state” of Palestine doesn’t exist, the entities currently representing Palestinians are corrupt, terrorist-addicted, dictatorships, fueled on anti-Jew hatred, abusing their own people in the West Bank and Gaza, and particularly hostile to Zionists – as well as fellow Palestinians advancing American liberal-democratic ideals. Ignoring those realities, falsely equating your own democratic country with its authoritarian enemies, confuses peacemaking with breast-beating.
Pit stop
Admittedly, a cynical British friend of mine was correct. Biden’s Israel visit was a most elaborate rest stop on the way to the Saudi Arabian “petrol station.” Still, Biden done good. He showed Democrats at home – and peaceniks in Israel – how to recognize the eternal ideals that make Israel Israel and link Americans and Israelis in our unique and mutually beneficial bond. For that, we should say, “Toda raba! Thank you, Mr. President.”
US taxpayer money, thanks to the Biden administration, is now once again going directly to an international agency that promotes messages of hate against Israel and denies its right to exist.
The claim that the UNRWA services contribute to maintaining regional stability is not only false, but, sadly, ridiculous.
On the contrary, most of the refugee camps have since become hotbeds for extremist and terrorist groups and individuals, especially in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Lebanon and Syria.
A study published earlier in early July.... found that children attending UNRWA schools are exposed to textbooks that include references to violence, martyrdom, overt antisemitism, jihad (holy war), rejection of the possibility of peace with Israel, and the complete omission of any historical Jewish presence in the region.
"[W]e found material that does not adhere to international standards and that encourages violence, jihad and martyrdom, antisemitism, hate, and intolerance...." — IMPACT-se study, July 2022.
Instead of pressuring UNRWA to change its policies and stop the anti-Israel incitement in its schools, the Biden administration has decided to reward the agency for encouraging hate, violence, martyrdom and the delegitimization and demonization of Israel and Jews.
The Biden administration, in short, has just sent a message to the Palestinians and all the Israel-haters that it supports their efforts and shares their dream of obliterating Israel.
Those who fund school textbooks that glorify terrorists and deny Israel's right to exist are complicit in the global jihad against Israel.