Op-eds
/ Israel and USA
Alongside the excitement and joy over the ongoing release of hostages, I can’t stop thinking that the deal for a ceasefire and hostage release could have been achieved long ago. It’s a “gut punch” to think of the hostages, soldiers and civilians in Gaza who were killed while we continued the futile war, which was one of the most justified ever at its outset but lost its strategic justification many months ago.
We owe it to ourselves to ask the question: Where did we go wrong? Why did we not allow the Biden administration to implement the detailed plan it had prepared for the day after the war in May, which included an alternative to Hamas in Gaza and the normalization of Israel’s relations in the region in a way that would provide security against Iran and its proxies? Why did the Biden administration fail to use the many levers the US has over the Israeli government to save us from the continuation of the catastrophe that has caused so much unnecessary suffering?
What allowed Trump, whose values could not be more contrary to those of the liberal camp in Israel and the United States, to succeed where the principled and Zionist Joe Biden failed?
One of the main reasons for this is the view, which still prevails among too many in our camp and the leadership of most Jewish organizations abroad, that there must be “no daylight” between the positions of the American administration and the Israeli government.
This approach is not only anachronistic but also truly harmful when Israel is led by a government whose main purpose is its own self-preservation. A purpose that often comes at the expense of Israel’s national interests. A purpose that goes against the position of the majority of the Israeli public and that of the liberal majority of American Jews, who have long supported the cessation of hostilities, the release of the hostages, and the defense of our democracy against attempts to destroy it.
Translating pressure
The Prevailing view is not only that it is forbidden to show a gap in positions, but even more so that it is forbidden to translate the gap into pressure on the Israeli government – even one as antagonistic and in need of reigning in as our current one.
A prominent example of this playing out was the criticism from some of the leaders of Israel’s liberal camp regarding the delay in supplying two-ton bombs ahead of the entry into Rafah. It was clear there was no operational need for these bombs, but it was a signal and a message to Israel that it must take the position of the American administration into consideration with regards to the risk of collateral damage.
Another example was the malicious attack in Israel and from many Jewish organizations in the US against the vote of 19 senators – all supporters of Israel and the special US relationship with Israel – who voted to disapprove of unrestricted weapons transfers and send a message to Biden and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that American aid is not a “blank check.”
The position of the senators was unambiguous: The US should not unconditionally support a futile war without a strategic plan to get hostages home or for the day after – and should not do so in violation of US and international law and in a manner that harms both American and Israeli interests.
Biden and his secretary of state Antony Blinken invested monumental efforts in building plans that could have dramatically and positively changed Israel’s situation in the region and brought back the hostages, but they failed to implement them because they feared the political repercussions of pressuring the Israeli government. The Biden administration continued to declare at every opportunity that the prevention of the deal was Hamas’s fault, even though it was as clear as a bell that Netanyahu was the main obstacle to the deal. They removed political pressure that could have gotten hostages home and ended the war sooner, contrary to their own stated goals.
Netanyahu immediately understood the dynamic and Biden’s weakness, openly disregarding American requests.
Hamas is indeed responsible for the atrocities of October 7 and is an openly jihadist, barbaric terrorist organization, but its position over the halting of the fighting to free the hostages has not changed since the first day of the negotiations. After the IDF completed the majority of its military tasks many months ago, there was no reason to prevent the conclusion of the deal other than Netanyahu’s narrow political considerations, primarily the preservation of the coalition.
Jewish organizations in the US supported the release of the hostages, but due to those anachronistic and harmful constraints, they failed to use their influence to actually do something about it. The automatic backing of the Israeli government’s position proved both absurd and dangerous.
This is not the first time that the tendency of many Jewish organizations and leaders in the Israeli liberal camp to align with right-wing governments here has caused strategic damage to Israel. The opposition to the nuclear deal between the P5+1 superpowers and Iran is another example.
They aligned with Netanyahu’s position, leading to the eventual Trump withdrawal from the agreement that had stopped Iran from developing weapons. In hindsight, it is now abundantly clear that the agreement was the best option available, and Trump’s withdrawal from it has resulted in Iran becoming a threshold nuclear state. It also allowed China and Russia to extricate themselves from the international coalition designed to prevent Iran’s nuclearization, and they are now both in a strategic alliance with the ayatollahs’ regime.
Another example was the support of many Jewish organizations and centrist leaders in Israel for Trump’s and Netanyahu’s policies to abandon the Palestinian issue in the framework of the Abraham Accords. This weakened the Palestinian factions that support a settlement and strengthened Hamas. Together with other moves to strengthen Hamas and weaken the Palestinian Authority, this was among the factors that led to October 7.
There is no doubt that there is an Israeli interest in normalization with Arab countries, but the attempt to achieve this goal while bypassing the Palestinian issue dramatically harms Israel’s security interests. Here too, the voice of many Jewish organizations was not to be heard.
The time has come for the majority in the Jewish community in the US and the centrist politicians in Israel who claim to lead the liberal camp to realize that the “no daylight” approach in Israel-US interaction only serves the agenda of the messianic Right and the survival of governments that harm Israel’s vital national security interests. It is high time for collaboration between the opponents of the far Right, on both sides of the ocean, to enable an American foreign policy that supports the values we believe in instead of the survival of Netanyahu and his supporters.
The article was published on February 2nd 2025 on The Jerusalem Post.
