The Biden White House’s latest intervention against Israel is nothing short of an abomination. In the middle of a war, it is threatening America’s closest ally in the Middle East with cutting off arms supply in 30 days’ time if its demands are not met. This is clearly not being done for any strategic, moral or diplomatic advantage. It appears designed merely to scrape together a few extra votes for Kamala Harris’s faltering election campaign.
The US administration is demanding an improvement in the humanitarian situation in Gaza, ordering Israel to facilitate increased aid delivery. But I have witnessed first-hand the Israel Defense Forces’ efforts to get aid into Gaza. Since soon after the war began, huge quantities have entered the Strip and continue to do so.
Any shortage of vital commodities should not be blamed on Israel, but on the failure by the UN and other agencies to actually deliver the aid to the people who need it. The UN’s efforts will have been impeded by inefficiency, but even more by Hamas’s seizure of aid. Media reports have shown Hamas terrorists proclaiming that their warehouses are full.
Hamas is reported to have sold aid donated by the international community in order to help sustain its terrorist capabilities. Stolen aid seems to have become a major source of income, with some estimating that the terrorist group has profited by at least half a billion dollars. It also uses aid distribution as a weapon to control the population, in a desperate effort to cling on to its authority. If you don’t do exactly what Hamas says, you are likely to go hungry.
Joe Biden’s attempt to pressure Israel by effectively blaming it for the humanitarian crisis rewards Hamas, empowers its continuing terrorist campaign, and will help prolong the conflict, further endangering both Palestinians and Israelis.
Israel is unquestionably winning its seven-front war, including in Gaza and Lebanon. Nevertheless, it does depend on US weapons and military equipment to finish the job. Should the United States follow through with an embargo, the consequences for Israel and the West could be catastrophic.
The administration’s threatening letter to Israel also speaks about growing health risks, especially in the over-crowded humanitarian areas in the south, where Gazans have sought refuge from the conflict. These concerns are real. But where are the demands on Egypt to allow refugees across onto their side of the border? The silence on this from the US, the UN and the international community is in stark contrast to the blame constantly being heaped on Israel, the country doing its best to defend its people against terrorist aggression.
Not only that, but earlier this year the Rafah crossing from Egypt into Gaza was shut. Where are the demands on Cairo to re-open the crossing if the US is indeed so deeply concerned about the deteriorating situation?
Israel’s policy has been to flood Gaza with aid. Any restrictions imposed are designed to limit the entry of weapons and dual-use commodities. That is absolutely necessary and a policy any other government would apply. Among other measures, Israel has created new aid crossing points and built roads inside Gaza specifically for aid delivery. I am not aware of any other conflict in which one of the combatants has taken such steps, or anything like them, to get aid to its enemy’s population at the same time and place as it is actively involved in combat operations and when it does not fully hold or occupy the territory that it is fighting over.
But as with so much else in this conflict, different rules and standards are expected of Israel by the US than it would even consider applying to itself or any other country. The United States’ latest demands are utterly unreasonable: Joe Biden and his officials will know very well the reality that I have described. It’s all about the election and the hope that turning on Israel will benefit Harris.
It won’t work, though. Woke, anti-Zionist radicals will not be satisfied with a threat that is carefully timed to take effect soon after the election. They don’t want the US to limit support for Israel, but for Israel no longer to exist. If Harris wins in November, Jerusalem needs to brace itself for even greater hostility than it has seen from the Biden administration.