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| Netanyahu and Biden -- Avi Ohayon, Israeli Government, via Associated Press |
It has been plain for sometime – even for those who have eyes but see not, ears but hear not – that Israel’s peace plan is to rid the Middle East of terrorist groups supported by Iran that have pledged to destroy Israel.
When news hit the airwaves that Israel had in an airstrike degraded
much of Hezbollah’s strike capacity and rid the Middle East of Hassan
Nasrullah, Hezbollah’s Secretary General, tears did not flow from Western eyes.
The Telegraph In a lead piece, “Israel has exposed the lie at the heart of
Starmer and Biden’s foreign policy,” noted, “Jerusalem has already
nearly destroyed Hamas’s organized military capabilities in Gaza and, combined
with “Operation Grim Beeper” just over a week ago, has repeatedly imposed shock
and awe on Hezbollah’s top cadres and infrastructure.”
The fearless Telegraph pointedly noted the obvious: “Britain
and America once understood what it meant to fight a multi-front war. They did
so together successfully in two World Wars, and then again during the Cold War.
“Today, Messrs Biden [President of the United States] and
Starmer [leader of the Labor Party and
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom]
have trouble with this concept. Fortunately, Israel’s leaders do not.
For the good of the West as a whole, Israel is now decimating our terrorist
enemies in the Middle East.”
The chatter within the Biden-Harris administration that
aggressive war measures by Israel would “broaden the war” was muted. In June of
2024, Connecticut Commentary noted that
Biden had refashioned his campaign position on Israel and Hamas: His
“refashioned campaign position is that Hamas has been sufficiently rebuked, and
the government of Israel, impudently resolved to continue the war to its
appointed end, should yield to the United States, the United Nations, and other
peace loving groups, in a collective effort to cut short the war and reimpose,
as quickly as possible, a so called ‘two state solution’ in the geographic
heart of Israel that has for the past few decades been a murderously proven
failure.”
Following Israel’s most recent attack on Hezbollah’s
political and military structure, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala
Harris, now running for president on the Democrat Party Ticket, curtsied in
Prime Mister Benjamin Netanyahu’s direction, a painful gesture for both
peacemakers. Previously, both had objected to Netanyahu’s aggressive military actions
and, more importantly to them, his obduracy in accepting their preferred “two
state solution” to quell military activity in the area.
Moments after Nasrallah was dispatched, Harris, on her way
to visit the US southern border for the first time, offered the following
statement: “Hassan Nasrallah was a terrorist with American blood on his hands.
Across decades, his leadership of Hezbollah destabilized the Middle East and
led to the killing of countless innocent people in Lebanon, Israel, Syria, and
around the world. Today, Hezbollah’s victims have a measure of justice. I have
an unwavering commitment to the security of Israel. I will always support
Israel’s right to defend itself against Iran and Iran-backed terrorist groups
such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis.”
Harris did not mention in her official statement that Hezbollah,
under the “fiery” direction of Nasrallah, was linked to the deaths of 23 people
in the bombings of two American embassy buildings in 1984. A year earlier, a suicide bomber detonated a
truck bomb at a building that served as a barracks for the 1st Battalion 8th
Marines (Battalion Landing Team – BLT 1/8) of the 2nd Marine Division, killing
220 marines, 18 sailors and three soldiers. The bombing made this incident the
deadliest single-day death toll for the United States Marine Corps since the
Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II. Washington declared Hezbollah a terror
group in October 1997.
Both Harris and Biden affirmed their “unwavering commitment”
to Israel’s security. Both said they would “always support Israel’s right to
defend itself against Iran and Iran-backed terrorist groups.” Harris cautiously
added that she and Biden “do not want to see conflict in the Middle East
escalate into a broader regional war,” according to a report in the Times of Israel, and were determined to achieve “a diplomatic solution” to the war
between Israel and its implacable terrorist enemies: Hamas, Hezbollah, the
Houthis in Yemen and, of course, Iran the leading sponsor of terrorism in the
Middle East.
A realist – or, as Democrats sometimes prefer, a pragmatic –
foreign policy on the Middle East would understand that Iran, the “ring of
fire” terrorists committed to Israel’s destruction, China and Putin’s Russia
are permanent, new axis-of-evil enemies of the United States, and that Israel
is what it had been ever since the country was first recognized by President
Harry Truman in 1948 – a bellwether of democracy.
Realists would also recognize that, at this point, calls for
a “two state solution” in the Middle East, a boiling cauldron of genocidal
hatred on the part of Shia Arabs that can only be slaked by the destruction of
Israel, are premature. Throughout history, peace has been the prerogative of
those victorious in war. Warrior victors determine a future peace.
Therefore, there is but one question the answer to which
must determine U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East: Who will determine the
shape of peace in Israel and environs – Israel or Iran?
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now answered that
question.
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