U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel earlier this week, speaking loudly and waving a small stick. While Blinken ostensibly represents America's national interests abroad, his job in Israel is all about Presidentish Joe Biden's reelection bid — and how Israeli's defensive military actions in the Gaza Strip are complicating things for Biden at home.
Blinken met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in hopes, once more, of getting a temporary ceasefire with Hamas. A truce would "give us something to build on," Blinken said.
Who is this "us," Kemosabe, and what are we trying to build?
Hamas has rejected every offer for a ceasefire and has admitted they don't have enough releasable — women, children, elderly — hostages still breathing to make a ceasefire worthwhile for Jerusalem. So why is Blinken back with Bibi again, asking for something that isn't for Israel to give and that Hamas won't?
It all comes down to Nov. 5 and the Big Backfire.
The Biden Cabal thought they could ride another popular protest movement to victory. But this isn't 2020. Hamas ain't George Floyd. Americans, by and large, respect Israel and despise rapists, kidnappers, and terrorists — we're funny like that.
So now poor SecState Blinken — never the sharpest penny in the pantry — finds himself tasked with the impossible: applying pressure he doesn't have to wrangle a ceasefire out of Israel that Hamas won't agree to, or his boss will lose Michigan and the Campus Commies that make up an increasing (and increasingly virulent) portion of the Democrat base.
Cue the world's smallest violin for the bed Biden made for himself.
Netanyahu has his own problems at home, of course. Many Israelis want a deal to get back the rest of the hostages, assuming any are still alive after enduring seven months of Hamas' tender mercies. At the same time, there is also pressure to make the final sweep through Rafah and end major combat actions in the Gaza Strip. Like so many things in public opinion, those two desires are mutually exclusive.
But as the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, Netanyahu's "poll numbers have stabilized in the wake of Iran’s drone-and-missile attack on Israeli soil and it is the Biden administration that is under pressure, as protests against Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip spread across U.S. college campuses." Emphasis added, although hardly required.
With a bit of effort, you can hear Bibi's voice in your head.
"You and your old boss, Barack Obama, spent years meddling in Israeli politics, trying to get me ousted — and now I'm supposed to throw my country's security concerns aside to save your bacon? That's hardly kosher, my friend."
I shake my head in disbelief when I think that Joe Biden — the man whose polls cratered, never to recover, following his bungled bugout from Afghanistan — thought he could use a foreign policy misadventure to bolster his reelection chances. But then again, Biden was always long on ego and short on accomplishments.
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