Biden Is Making a Serious Mistake on Israel — and the World Is at Risk

The Biden administration recently announced that it will withhold military aid from Israel if the IDF launches an operation in Rafah, the last Hamas stronghold in Gaza and the likely location of many Israeli hostages.

Israel — which sees defeating Hamas in Rafah as absolutely necessary for its safety and survival — subsequently began preliminary operations in Rafah’s outskirts. The White House responded by carrying out its threat with respect to certain weapons shipments. There are several possible reasons why President Biden may be taking such a path, but — paradoxically — none of them are likely to be served by this decision.

Israel has defied the United States before, despite threats to military aid. President Truman was strongly against David Ben-Gurion’s decision to declare independence in 1948. Though Truman was a strong ally — and though America recognized Israel’s statehood — the US also joined an international arms embargo against the new country. President Reagan, another strong ally, was enraged by Israel’s 1981 bombing of Iraq’s nuclear reactor and halted the sales of F-16 fighter jets, though he relented two months later.

The present threat from the White House is ostensibly based on a concern for civilian casualties in Rafah due to its large population concentration. This is a unique situation created by the structure of the Gaza war: since October, Israel has defeated Hamas’ battalions in stages, starting from northern Gaza and moving south. In contrast to most armies worldwide, the IDF sacrificed the element of surprise by moving civilians out of combat zones at each stage, with many eventually ending up in Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city.

As a result, Rafah came to contain more than a million people, fully half of Gaza’s population.

However, the White House’s concern is fundamentally unfounded: in the past two weeks, Israel has already moved 950,000 people out of Rafah, largely to one of the many “humanitarian islands” established by the IDF throughout Gaza. These “islands” provide access to humanitarian aid and field hospitals, with many offering superior medical care compared to Gaza’s conventional hospitals.

No military in history has moved so many civilians out of a war zone, so quickly and safely, and the evacuation is still continuing. These and other strategies have helped to produce the lowest civilian to combatant casualty ratio in human history, nine times lower than the UN global average.

In addition to being disconnected from the present reality in Rafah, the White House’s threat is unlikely to inhibit Israel’s military activities. Military aid is typically ordered months in advance, for resupply rather than for immediate need, therefore, by the time current supplies run low, the Rafah activities will likely be long since over. Moreover, the specific weapons Washington is withholding are heavy ammunition of the sort that is less relevant in urban warfare. The White House has indicated it may extend this policy to other weapons, but it’s currently unclear whether Washington truly wants Israel to halt its operation, or merely wants to make a show of objecting to it.

Why would the White House pursue a nonsensical and ultimately ineffective strategy of publicly breaking with Israel?

One possibility relates to elections. Some far-left lawmakers and activists are vocally hostile to Israel, including calls to end military support and echoing the “river to the sea” chant (widely understood as a call for Israel’s destruction).

A recent survey by TIPP Insights, in coordination with my organization, RealityCheck, shows that 59% of Democrats believe (erroneously) that Israel is committing genocide, a sentiment reflected in the violent anti-Israel and anti-America protests on college campuses.

Yet by catering to the far left, candidate Biden may cost himself the middle, and perhaps lose more votes than he gains. Candidates who “capture the middle” are historically more likely to win by large margins, such as Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, and John F. Kennedy. Indeed 80% of Americans support Israel over Hamas, and mainstream lawmakers in both parties oppose Biden’s policy: Republican Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) called withholding weapons “obscene” given that Israel is “at a time of great peril,” and Democratic Congressman Ritchie Torres (NY) said, “America cannot claim that its commitment to Israel is “iron-clad” and then proceed to withhold aid from Israel.”

Shortly after October 7, I was interviewed on an Arab language television program. The interviewer was puzzled that the US would support Israel at all, given Washington’s criticisms throughout 2023 over Israel’s judicial reform controversy.

I answered, “Israel is a democracy, and that makes Israel part of a global family of democracies. Families don’t always agree, but that doesn’t make them enemies.” I realized an important truth in that moment: dissent is rare in dictatorships (which includes effectively all of the Arab world) and therefore not always understood. America’s enemies see dissent as a sign of weakness and an opportunity to attack, while America’s allies, who are watching events in Israel closely, worry whether they can trust America with their survival.

Congressman Torres articulated this concern when he said, “The mixed messaging makes a mockery of our credibility as an ally. No one will take our word seriously.”

The White House strategy is disconnected from events in Gaza, unlikely to be effective as leverage against Israel, and not even likely to achieve the more cynical goal of winning votes. So one has to ask, why is President Biden endangering Israel’s security, America’s precious credibility, and the safety of the entire free world — by playing into the hands of Iran, Hamas, and other malicious actors?

Daniel Pomerantz is the CEO of RealityCheck Research.

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