Joe Biden isn’t giving up in his effort to try and convince Israel to de-escalate their ground war from major combat operations to smaller and less intense operations.
Last week he sent Jake Sullivan to carry this news to Netanyahu, who quickly rejected it. Now he’s sending his Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to Tel Aviv to do the same thing:
WASHINGTON (AP) — The top two U.S. military leaders are traveling to Tel Aviv to advise the Israeli government on how to transition from major combat operations against Hamas in Gaza to a more limited campaign and prevent a wider regional war. Their trip comes as Iranian-backed militants on Saturday launched a wave of attack drones against ships in the Red Sea and said they would continue until Israel’s “aggression” ends.
U.S. defense leaders are hoping to prevent the risk of wider regional conflict, both through a sustained high level of U.S. military presence and by engaging with the Israelis to get them to move beyond the massive bombardment campaign.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. CQ Brown, who are heading to Israel, served in leadership roles as U.S. airpower and ground forces moved from major combat to lower-intensity counterterrorism operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. But it is not clear how deeply their advice from lessons learned will resonate with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
Their trip highlights the increased efforts by the Biden administration to convince Israel that it should scale back its offensive…
U.S. officials have been telling Israel for several weeks that its window is closing for concluding major combat operations in Gaza without risking the loss of even more backing.
In a meeting Thursday, Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, urged Netanyahu to shift to more targeted operations by smaller military teams hunting specific high-value targets, rather than the sustained broad bombardment that has occurred so far. In response, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said his country would continue major combat operations against Hamas for several more months.
It’s despicable for Biden to push so hard on this issue, especially when he’s being pushed by pro-Hamas Democrats in this country to get Israel to stop its justified aggression in Gaza. At the end of the day I believe that’s what all of this is about.
Will there be a wider regional conflict if Israel exterminates Hamas and stays in Gaza? Maybe, yes. But what choice do they have? Israel must protect its own people after what we saw on October 7th. And if there is a wider conflict, it won’t be Israel’s fault. You can’t blame Israel for the Houthis firing ballistic missiles at ships in the Red Sea. You can’t blame Israel for all the attacks on US bases in Iraq and Syria. This war was started by Hamas and Iran because Iran is dead set on annihilating all the Jews in Israel. That’s who is to blame and at the end of the day the fight must be taken to them.