Joe Biden will not be the Democratic nominee in November’s presidential election, thankfully. He is not withdrawing because he’s being held responsible for enabling war crimes against the Palestinian people (though a recent poll does have nearly 40 percent of Americans saying they’re less likely to vote for him thanks to his handling of the war). Yet it’s impossible to extricate the collapse in public faith in the Biden campaign from the “uncommitted” movement for Gaza. They were the first people to refuse him their votes, and defections from within the president’s base hollowed out his support well in advance of the debate.
The Democrats and their presumptive nominee Kamala Harris are faced with a choice: On the one hand, they can continue Biden’s monstrous support for Netanyahu, the brutal IDF, and Israel’s genocide of Palestinians. That would help allow the party to cover for Biden and put a positive spin on a smooth handoff, even though we all know this would mainly benefit the embittered president himself and his small coterie of loyalists. Such a choice would confirm that the institutional rot that allowed the current situation to develop still characterizes the party.
At this point it’s very clear it’s not Biden’s policy that is holding things up. It’s very clearly Netanyahu and his cabinet. This isn’t even a question anymore as Benny Gantz straight said so when he resigned, and then Netanyahu dissolved his war cabinet, so he’s basically acting in direct control of Israeli forces it seems.
Biden and team had a ceasefire agreement, Israel said they agreed, Palestine said they agreed, yet Israel refuses to sign or stop military assault. As far as the “undecided” voters go, they aren’t going to get their way. The US as a nation is not going to jeopardize ties with Israel as a proxy military force and ground position in the Middle East for a small percentage of voters. It is what it is, but put the blame where it belongs in the here and now.
The United States should throw Israel under a bus.
The United States would be throwing its own strategic interests under a bus.
I know this may come as a shock, but the US government is well aware what is happening over there, and knows considerably more that the average person. They aren’t doing nothing because of lack of evidence, or death, or allegations (both proven and otherwise). They do nothing because its in their interests to do so.
I use the example of “no blood for oil”. They only said that because they still had oil - start losing access to key parts of your strategic access and absolutely we would be crying for war.
There is no strategic interest in Israel that isn’t better done by another country.
What country would be better suited to support the Carter Doctrine that is vital to US interests?
Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq, Qatar, Djibouti, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Turkey.
Just to name a few countries with large American military bases, extant militaries, and intelligence agencies.
So none better, only other bad options
Better than Israel. We weren’t getting half of the stuff from Israel that we get from our other Middle Eastern allies.
The US has little to no influence over Israeli domestic politics. Pretending that Israel is a puppet state of the US is… delusional.
Well then they won’t mind when we stop providing US made weapons to continue their aggressions, cutoff the billions in annual support, and stop blocking international efforts at holding them accountable. Why would Netanyahu be addressing our government if we had no skin in the game?
You’re either uninformed or trolling, we are Israel’s largest ally and we constantly shield them from international repercussions.
Cope
You don’t understand, this is the only chance for the east to eradicate Israel AND the USA.
It doesn’t matter if their moral stance is built on lies and dishonesty. Morality was never their lynchpin.
Ronald Reagan made one phone call and the Israelis immediately stopped bombarding Lebanon. The vassal state has to do whatever the fuck the US president wants. It’s a complete joke to think otherwise. Joe Biden could go on TV right now and publicly withdraw support for the occupiers and their government and military would collapse overnight.
Oh, awesome. Let’s time travel back then and act like it’s now, OH WAIT.
The Israeli state of 40 years only existed due to the US and it’s money. That’s not necessarily the same situation now. They can buy their own toys, and not be a puppet of the US if they didn’t want to now.
You seriously think the Israeli state could survive a loss of US support? They are just as much a vassal as they were then, if not more. They are completely isolated on the world stage and surrounded by geopolitical rivals. Their society is crumbling as we speak. Without the US playing defense, the international community would have come down on Israel decades ago. Do you remember how much they freaked out when Joe Biden kinda sorta hinted that he might possibly not send them all the bombs they wanted?
That’s not the issue. In fact, if the US didn’t pay their bills, we already know what will happen, and it’s a national security scenario that is gamed and updated regularly.
So say Israel is like “fuck you, pay me” to the US, and we cut them off. They are surrounded by hostile territories that will immediately put all their resources into attacking them and trying to wipe them off the map. Russia and China will probably proxy war this out as well. Then what? Maybe a coalition is made from a few of the Middle Eastern countries, groups hostile towards the US are fully enabled and encouraged to fuck with us, so now you have a new Middle East united group aligned with Russia and China to fuck around with Europe and Africa. Doesn’t sound super great to me. You’re pretty much kicking off a precursor to another world war, and Israel knows this. I’m sure they’ve probably just flatly said it behind closed doors.
“According to our simulations that we ran for ourselves, very bad things will happen if we are not in charge. Therefore anything we do to maintain hegemony is justified.”
Forgive me for sleeping on some sort of Orson Scott Card geopolitics fantasy, based on assumptions that other countries will be just as imperialistic as the USA. I’m much more concerned about the current ongoing genocide of the Palestinians that has continued for over 50 years.
The US gives israel what, like 3-4billion a year? Their defense budget was like 24b in 2023. They’d be fine without us.
Ok, deal, let’s do that and find out
Israel has in many ways closer ties to Russia today than to the US. Roughly a million Israelis are from Russia.
And almost 3 million Americans are from Russia. What’s your point?
1 million out of 11.4 million = 8.7%
Or 3 million out of 335 million = 0.9%
A lot has changed in 40 years. Jewish money in politics, for one.
I wouldn’t personally go with “Jewish Money” as the terminology…😬
That aside, certainly the effect of AIPAC and friends is a part of the pathology. That doesn’t change the fact that Joe Biden could end the genocide anytime he wanted. The Zionist entity cannot survive without US hard power backing.
I mean, it comes from people who identify as Jewish and who support the state of Israel. How is that not correct?
Joe Biden cannot stop Israel. They have openly and repeatedly made known their plan to conquer Gaza. They’re already allowing “settlers” (terrorists) in to attack the local Palestinians and steal their land. American citizens, including many who donate to AIPAC, are getting involved in land deals for the conquered territory.
The entire powerbase of the western world is either taking part in the genocide and/or profiting from it or unable to do the right thing because of the political and financial power of the former.
Even if that wasn’t the case, Israel is the only friendly nation in the middle east for western powers. Iran regularly starts shit and Saudi Arabia committed 9/11 (which we ignore because they have oil). A Jewish state is much friendlier to the (mostly white, Christian) government of the US.
Joe Biden could order a blockade on the single functioning port. Joe Biden’s Treasury department could instantly destroy the occupier economy with sanctions, as they should be doing under US and international law. Joe Biden could signal to the Iranians and Hezbollah that Israel is no longer allowed to operate with impunity.
Don’t make the mistake of confusing pretend impotence for true impotence.
I agree that the entire West is complicit in the genocide.
Regarding “friendly nations,” what happened to make the Iranians unfriendly to the United States?
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And do you know how many American lives are being saved by letting Israel fight Iran as a proxy rather than letting it fall and having to deal with the headache afterwards?
Israel is a strategic asset in a larger war, and a lot of people are clearly missing that concept because they don’t think the US and Iran are actually at war with each other. It’s the same reason why the embargo of Cuba still exists.
Geopolitics is complicated, and most of it is not out in the open for the public to see.
And do you know how many American lives are being saved by letting Israel fight Iran as a proxy rather than letting it fall and having to deal with the headache afterwards?
Wow, what an argument. Look the other way and prop up the genocidal apartheid state because otherwise we might have to use blood in addition to treasure to defend imperial interests in the Middle East. Just…wow.
It’s the same reason why the embargo of Cuba still exists.
What reason is that exactly?
I mean, yea. You think the world is some happy go lucky place where people don’t fight each other?
The US dropped two nuclear bombs on civilians in Japan to end a war quickly, and despite the backlash they’d kill civilians again in a heartbeat if it was beneficial to America. The number of civilians that died from the American invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan after 9/11 shows that very clearly. The current Palestinian death toll is less than 10% of that 20 year conflict, and it was done by Americans directly.
Cuba is being used as a pawn by other countries to threaten the US, the same as it was during the cold war. Russia and China didn’t write off $40 billion dollars for free over the last decade.
I mean, yea. You think the world is some happy go lucky place where people don’t fight each other?
Umm…lol no. I think the world is run by military forces and their obedient governments.
The US dropped two nuclear bombs on civilians in Japan to end a war quickly
Vaporize civilians for peace!
they’d kill civilians again in a heartbeat if it was beneficial to America
If by America you mean imperial warmaking and profits then yes, “they” have, would, and will continue.
The number of civilians that died from the American invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan after 9/11 shows that very clearly. The current Palestinian death toll is less than 10% of that 20 year conflict, and it was done by Americans directly
This point is really confusing but…yay America?
Cuba is being used as a pawn by other countries to threaten the US
Wow what a take. Other countries support Cuba, so the USA gets to perpetuate invasions, assassination attempts, terrorism and eternal economic warfare. The Cubans have no autonomy but also they brought this on themselves.
Vaporize civilians for peace!
What happened the next day?
There would certainly be peace the day after a nuclear apocalypse too
If you want to compare casualties then you need to compare the same periods. The average monthly casualties for the period we had data was far higher than the war on Iraq. Which is kind of to be expected since we were there for 10 years. It’s also a much larger country with more people exposed to proportionally larger forces fighting.
So let’s do this the right way. According to the Iraqi Body Count project around 200,000 civilians were killed. Or 0.8 percent of civilians in Iraq. In Gaza that number is 2 percent. More than double. And that’s just the bodies that made it to a morgue while the health ministry was still capable of accurately counting bodies. Estimates of people who are missing, presumed dead, under the rubble are in the six figure range. So let’s be generous and set the total at 100,000, so 60k under rubble, far below the estimates. That’s 5 percent of the civilian population dead.
This is not a road you want to go down. Any analysis beyond the most shallow reflects extremely poorly on Israel.
Percentage of the total population is a bad stat, a dead person regardless of how many people you started with.
The point I was trying to make is that the US is clearly okay with killing civilians.
Right. Those two ratios are clearly the mark of countries with the same attitude towards civilian deaths.
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They CAN’T come out and say it or it turns into a real war rather than a background proxy war and that ends up causing more problems. The world is not a nice place, there are a lot of people (and governments) out to try to gain an advantage, including the US itself.
The Truth can be extremely offensive, and offending certain people can be dangerous. Some things need to remain a secret, or at least somewhat hidden, even from the American people.
American people don’t want to know how much their individual life is valued at for example. The government makes that decision every single day when it sets regulations or funds various programs, but people would be extremely pissed off to find out. That doesn’t help people, and it doesn’t help the government, so they bury that information under piles of statistics.
Gotta admit, it’s interesting how I specifically mentioned politicians and media networks and you responded by alluding to a vague “government” entity that seemingly acts on its own.
In my mind, the government is just a name for the politicians people elected. It’s like saying corporations seek profit like they have feelings and desires or something, and not like they’re falling explicit laws and instructions set forth by politicians, which again are human beings that we’ve specifically elected.
That said, at least you answered my question, albeit without ever actually considering it
SA would like a word.
I mean, yeah, that’s largely true with regard to who’s holding progress on peace talks up, but I want to see any and all military aid that’s not purely defensive that we’re sending to Israel cut off, like, yesterday. There is zero reason why we should be selling and delivering new F-35s and JDAMs to the IDF when they’re just using them to flatten the Gaza Strip.
Biden doesn’t have to give them weapons to do it though.
Didn’t Harris just refuse to meet with Bibi?
She is meeting with Bibi in private
God damnit
In public she can get him to make statements that he can be held to. Biden’s been doing private meetings this whole time and Netanyahu just denies everything. Public meetings suggest a far less friendly tone.
Harris has taken over $5m from AIPAC. They are gonna expect results for their
bribecontributionYou mean giving Bombs and Money to Israel while saying “Israel is iffy” wasn’t a Good Policy?
The best time to fix this was last year. The next best time is now.
Since severing ties with Israel would only lead to more chaos in the region, what I’m really hoping for is Kamala 2025, followed by a change in Israeli leadership to mirror the recent US, UK, and French elections that have seen a broadly decimated right wing, and a strengthening of the centre left view of an international rules-based order. We could potentially see Bibi’s regime tried for war crimes, China dissuaded from its designs on Taiwan, and Russia faced with stiffer international resolve in Ukraine and beyond.
I’m not prepared to defend any of that as immensely realistic, but writing it was the little taste of hope I needed in the moment.
Since severing ties with Israel would only lead to more chaos in the region
Oh I’m sold. Do as much genocide as you want, as long as you are an implement of United States’ resource extraction policy.
We would certainly prefer you didn’t do the genocide, but loss of hegemony is what is truly unacceptable, that’s a red line we won’t cross.
I was just imagining a slightly better world, as a treat. Of course I’d prefer an even better outcome like peace and willing reparations, but I wasn’t in the mood for an entirely counterfactual daydream. The current reality is an actual nightmare.
You know, I definitely ignored the rest of your comment, that’s fair.
I share your hope that VP Harris won’t be as intransigent in support of the occupiers as Biden.
The choice is more like permitting the current ongoing tragedy or allow an even greater genocide (the eradication of Israel).
Definitely a false choice, right off the bat.
The USA could impose a no-fly zone based on the 1949 borders.
The settlers could be rightly expelled from the West Bank.
Palestine could be recognized as an independent state.
None of that requires any cooperation from the right-wing death cult currently controlling the occupiers.
None of that requires a genocide, just the long overdue abandonment of illegal settlements.
just the long overdue abandonment of illegal settlements
‘Just’. Green Line didn’t work in 1949. Why would it work now? You really think anything but Israel ceasing to exist would stop this nonsense?
Was there a no-fly zone and recognition of an independent state in 1949? Why are you treating right-wing genocidists as though they are a force of nature?
Seems like quick work for the armored bulldozers so beloved by the occupiers, if karma is a real thing…
Oh! A no-fly zone! Of course! THAT is what would have solved it all. My bad.
The solution is not enabling the settlers and ultra-orthodox.
Another option is destroying / blockading the last functioning Zionist port, I expect that will get results real quick. They have decided to build their civilization inspired by the worst excesses of the West, so it will quickly collapse in the absence of endless imports.
Once you turn the grim logic of destroying houses and resource starvation back on the occupiers, you don’t have to keep pretending that they are mysterious, incomprehensible, and immovable.
followed by a change in Israeli leadership to mirror the recent US, UK, and French elections that have seen a broadly decimated right wing and a strengthening of the centre left view of an international rules-based order.
new labor mp’s in the uk have decided to support the genocide and threatened the icc from ruling against isreal, as the tories promised, and macron is intriguing with the far right to run france, saying that nobody won the election. so yes, their voters wanted center left; but their leaders are ignoring it and forcing the status quo.
the us election is still over 3 months away. kamala isn’t much different than biden in ways that matter and all indications suggests that she’s going to continue supporting the genocide as well despite publicly advocating against it the entire time it’s been a thing.
You saw someone write a thing that they openly admitted was unrealistic and purely to indulge in a crumb of hope, and you felt this comment was necessary. Are you okay?
hopium is the reason we got biden and what other awful politicians use as cover to get elected.
the real world sucks and hopium is a children’s coping mechanism; i hope you’re the one that’s okay.
Tough guy talking mad shit on the internet. You’re so cool.
not shit; just common sense
Biden’s problem is that he has no “Gaza policy”. He has an “Israel policy” and as long as Israeli interests are major political donators, that’s not going to change.
https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus?ind=Q05
Remember how everyone was making a big deal over Harris raising $81 million in 24 hours?
Imagine that success being $19 million underwater because of AIPAC dollars:
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/03/03/aipac-israel-spending-democratic-primaries-00144552
The entire last week:
Nature is healing.
Nature ain’t fully healed yet. A big pile of Christian nationalists and people conned by billionaires are going to rollout hard for Trump in Nov.
Thank you, Jesus.
Far more worried about the “Democrats” who were trying to force a Trump presidency by insisting we nominate Biden. They need to be ostracized and held accountable. Scratch a Blue MAGA and you find genocide supporting zionist under the cheap tin foil of abwd. They just about cost us the entire game.
Who ever they are, where ever they are, the need to be named, shamed, and ignored.
Kamala can make a strong move on this with her VP pick. Its not even a “nice to have”, its a need to have. Biden had cost the Democrats MI, WI, and turned MN into a swing state; this was 100% due to his ABSOLUTE bumbling of Gaza. Those voters are now “available” again.
There are plenty of progressives like Jamie Raskin she could pick, but it doesn’t really matter. She NEEDS all three of those states for an EC victory, and she doesn’t get them with the current policies. Either she can anchor and the VP can move, or the VP can anchor and Kamala moves. Either way, its pretty obvious what she needs to do, because there is no path to the WH without these states.
bidens policy has been more pro gaza/ceasefire then american policy towards gaza for a long time why would you want to break from it
Divert all weapon shipments to Ukraine, and refuse to support Israel until they withdraw and hold a ceasefire for at least X time.
That’s the policy that they should be using, not some confused geriatric Zionist’s policies.
The Jews themselves declared the US to be Zion before WWII. Time for them to come home, and leave the Palestinians alone
The fleeting election interference of course.
There’s nothing pro Palestinian about repeating Israeli propaganda uncritically, blaming the Palestinians for everything, and being the primary supplier of weapons and ammunition for the genocide.
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It’s kinda like whiplash to read someone who combines obvious contempt for the President and a willingness to indulge in wild conspiratorial speculation coming from the left. I was surprised again when the last paragraph frames Harris’ possible Israel policy as a question. By that point, I expected the author to explain to me what was going to happen.
Anyway, I suppose Harris to be chillier toward Israel, but doubt she’ll usher in a sea change. Especially before November.
“progressive””leftists” to the dance floor
It’s also time to start realizing that Israel is its own country and the US can’t control everything it does. They have their own democracy.
They can do as they please without unconditional support.
