Support for Israel has been in decline for years. The brutal Hamas massacre of October 7 initially looked like it might turn things around with a wave of sympathy for the traumatized Jewish state, but that was soon lost in clouds of smoke billowing from Israeli bombs exploding over Gaza.
President Joe Biden demonstrated his longtime affection and support for Israel by flying there 11 days later to personally embrace and assure the country of his and America’s full support – politically, diplomatically, financially, and most of all militarily. It was the first time a sitting president had gone to an ally in a time of war, and it happened as Israelis were still reeling from the shock.
Biden dispatched two carrier battle groups and other military resources to protect Israel at a vulnerable time, and he addressed the American people in a 15-minute Oval Office speech expressing full American support.
Bibi turns a deaf ear to US concerns
Before leaving Israel, he warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, “Don’t be consumed by rage,” recounting the mistakes the United States made in its “war on terror.” It wasn’t the first or the last time Netanyahu turned a deaf ear to the counsel and interests of his country’s most vital ally.
The prime minister was reportedly also getting similar advice from IDF leaders, who were recommending a limited military operation in northern Gaza instead of an all-out assault. But Netanyahu and his hard-line cabinet declared total war against Hamas. The most extreme among them have been calling the shots since taking office in December 2022, notably National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.
Ben-Gvir has multiple criminal convictions, including for supporting terrorist organizations and incitement to racism. He is said to feel it is more urgent to drive the Palestinians out of the strip, reoccupy it, and start building settlements than to rescue the hostages. Netanyahu listens to him because if these religious and nationalist extremists quit the government, Netanyahu will not only lose power but possibly go to prison for bribery, fraud, and corruption.
Israelis condemn calls for a Palestinian state “from the river to the sea” as genocide, but is that any different from when Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, and their crowd are working for a Jewish state “from the river to the sea?” The sympathy and support for Israel following October 7 looked like it could halt or even reverse the decline in Israel’s shrinking international stature but Netanyahu quickly put it back on the downhill track.
The US-Israel relationship has seen many crises and seemed to recover each time. Most of those involved the administration while Congressional support remained firm and protective, but it is on Capitol Hill where the greatest weakening appears this time. This crisis is arguably more widespread than any in memory, reaching into the nation’s grassroots and the Jewish community.
The level of congressional criticism and anger is alarming. Most is coming from Democrats, even though their party has been a stalwart supporter of Israel and the party of choice for most Jewish voters. Many Jewish lawmakers have joined the criticism.
Unlike prior wars, saturated media coverage of the war brings home the scale of human and physical damage in Gaza. Anti-Israel demonstrations on American campuses are having a divisive and dramatic impact.
One lesson of the extensive anti-Israel demonstrations during Holocaust Remembrance week is the failure to educate recent generations about the greatest human disaster in history, so they may better understand the Israeli trauma of October 7 and its largest daily death toll of Jews since the Holocaust.
West Bank violence
MEANWHILE, THE West Bank is on fire as settler violence spreads while the government seems to be doing its best to ignore or even condone it.
Once again the catalyst has been Netanyahu’s surrender to the extremists. Yossi Alpher, a former Mossad analyst, has said the prime minister appears more afraid of going to jail and losing his job than saving the lives of more soldiers and the hostages. That approach has done great damage inside Israel and among its friends worldwide.
For 10 months, hundreds of thousands of Israelis took to the streets in peaceful demonstrations against the anti-democratic plan to quash Israel’s independent judiciary. Those demonstrations stopped after October 7 and more recently have been replaced by marches calling for the return of the hostages and new elections.
Netanyahu faces pressure from two directions. Ben-Gvir and the hawks want a brutal military victory in Gaza and a possible reoccupation. Most Israelis, polls show, want a ceasefire and return of the hostages. So does Biden.
When their private messages were ignored, the president and top officials increasingly saw the need to go public. Many felt Netanyahu was deliberately slow-walking humanitarian assistance and indifferent to international concern for the innocent civilian victims of the Israeli bombing campaign.
Jewish Insider reports 86 House Democrats, including several Jewish lawmakers, have accused Israel of violating US law by the “deliberate withholding of humanitarian aid” to Gaza and are calling for an investigation. Similar charges are being brought in the Senate. Palestinian allies have filed genocide and war crimes charges against Israel at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
Netanyahu has been bombing homes and buildings in Gaza and burning bridges around the world, most importantly in America. His government’s conduct of the war has been a global public relations and political disaster for Israel.
A new ABC News/IPSOS poll showed nearly four in 10 Americans say the United States is being too supportive of Israel, up from 31% in January. A third of respondents are saying the United states should be doing more to protect Palestinian civilians. A March Gallup poll found more than half of Americans disapprove of Israel’s conduct in the war.
Palestinians are benefiting from the outrage over Israel’s retaliation for October 7 and the ensuing high casualty toll among Gaza’s women and children exacerbated by the ensuing humanitarian crisis.
Biden has been pressing Netanyahu to avoid a full-scale assault on Rafah, where an estimated million Palestinians have taken refuge. But the prime minister insists no one, not even the President of the United States, can stop him.
That apparently led to Biden halting the delivery of two types of precision-guided bombs and possibly other munitions, an unprecedented move in wartime. Many in Congress, including some of Israel’s best friends, have been calling for conditioning military aid, particularly halting offensive weapons deliveries.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned Netanyahu that a Rafah assault could negatively impact US-Israel relations – if it hasn’t already.
I’VE BEEN speaking with long-time pro-Israel activists as well as foreign policy and political pros, and few see much chance of a turnaround. Here’s what I’m hearing.
•Israel under Netanyahu has squandered the virtual wall-to-wall bipartisan support it enjoyed for many years on Capitol Hill.
• Stopping the downward slide must begin with new Israeli and Palestinian leadership bringing new attitudes and a genuine commitment to reconciliation. It starts at home, with both sides building pro-peace constituencies.
• Arab leaders will need to give more than lip service to the Palestinians and show they are ready to integrate Israel into the region.
• Among the palliative moves suggested are a freeze on settlement expansion, a serious crackdown on anti-Palestinian violence in the West Bank, and a dramatic Israeli peace overture to the Palestinians.
• Hamas is not just an Israeli problem. Bear in mind that Yahya Sinwar planned and ordered October 7 in large part to derail Israeli-Saudi normalization talks, which he feared would sideline the Palestinians. That budding alliance was also considered a security threat to Hama’s patrons in Tehran. They rightly saw an expanded Abraham Accords as not just Sunni Arabs doing business with the Zionists but forming a regional defense alliance against Iran.
Hamas is a regional problem, and it is time for Netanyahu and his government to put it in perspective and work toward a regional solution.
The writer is a Washington-based journalist, consultant, lobbyist, and former American Israel Public Affairs Committee legislative director.