President Joe Biden professes his love for Israel and his respect for the Jewish state. On Oct. 18, 2023, he traveled to Tel Aviv to declare, “As long as the United States stands — and we will stand forever — we will not let you ever be alone.”
Today, letting Israel be alone is exactly what Biden intends to do. As Israel fights a seven-front war initiated by Iran and its proxy terrorist groups, Biden has frozen arms shipments allegedly in anger at Israel’s refusal to allow Hamas to preserve its Rafah safe haven.
On its face, the policy is counterproductive. By publicly freezing arms to Israel while simultaneously providing weaponry to Qatar and Lebanon and waiving sanctions on Iran, the Biden administration signals to Hamas that it can take a harder line and it convinces Iran that defeat of Israel is a possibility. Biden also betrays remaining American hostages, held illegally by Hamas. Freezing arms transfers after Holocaust Remembrance Day simply added insult to injury.
Why then did the White House take such a counterproductive stance? The cynical explanation would be that Biden threw Israel under the bus because his aides believe it necessary to win the Muslim vote in Michigan and Minnesota. That could be an impeachable offense, though, as it mirrors Democratic accusations of playing politics with national security that were at the heart of President Donald Trump’s first impeachment.
A more troubling explanation could be at play: As Biden’s acuity and stamina suffer, national security adviser Jake Sullivan has more autonomy than any predecessor. Sullivan rules policy with an iron fist, but he substitutes academic theory for life experience. He believes the U.S.-Israel relationship to be a liability and that the long game requires ripping the Band-Aid off and ending support for the Jewish state, even at the risk of its existence.
Sullivan confuses cynicism with strategy. After the criminally negligent withdrawal from Afghanistan, Sullivan told a gathering in Aspen, “It had to come to an end.” On the facts, Sullivan was deceptive. While nation-building wasted blood and treasure, by 2017 American forces in Afghanistan cost little more than the military presence in Japan and Korea. The Afghanistan investment was worth it. Around 3,000 troops kept the Taliban out of Kabul and every district capital.
With the ego of Henry Kissinger, the skill of Rex Tillerson, and the naivete of Frank Kellogg, Sullivan appears to believe he alone has the foresight to make hard decisions. Simply put, he believes the price of betrayal of allies is worth it. Afghans already pay the price for his cynicism, but Americans will soon as the U.S. withdrawal provides inspiration for terrorism globally.
Then, there is Nagorno-Karabakh. When Azerbaijan cast diplomacy aside, broke its 2020 ceasefire, and blockaded the self-governing, democratic Armenian region, Sullivan put out feelers about relocating the region’s residents, with little care that this amounted to ethnic cleansing. When Azerbaijan used military force to drive out the region’s residents, the White House stood down, seemingly believing that ending the conflict was the sophisticated thing to do even if it meant betraying liberty, emboldening a dictator, and erasing a 1,700-year heritage. Syrian Kurds now face the same cynical calculation as Sullivan appeases Turkey.
Back to Israel: Sullivan would not be the first American official to believe betrayal of Israel to be a virtue. After Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal and sought to blockade the Jewish state, France, the United Kingdom, and Israel responded militarily. President Dwight D. Eisenhower sided with Nasser for the cynical reason that Arab states outnumbered Jewish ones.
His decision almost destroyed NATO and shook U.S.-Israel relations to their core. Arab states did not embrace America, though. Within two years, Eisenhower realized his error and sought to rectify it. As a democracy, Israel was simply a better ally.
What Sullivan does, though, is worse. He emboldens enemies to believe war works and anti-Zionism is a solution. Ethnic cleansing and betrayal have become his brand, but the lives he now risks with his arrogance will number in the millions.
