Netanyahu: Robert Gates Had It Right on Biden

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Benjamin Netanyahu has a couple of peeves to get off his chest. Now that the American electorate has retired Joe Biden and the Obamaite foreign-policy establishment, the Israeli PM suddenly feels free to do so — and to do so publicly.

Speaking to the Knesset today, Netanyahu ripped the guidance and pressure from Biden and Antony Blinken over the last thirteen months in the wake of the October 7 terrorist attacks. Every single strategic demand made by Biden and Blinken during that time turned out to be wrong, which echoes a warning made by former Defense Secretary Robert Gates about Biden’s supposed foreign-policy expertise.

The gloves are finally off:

“The US had reservations and suggested that we not enter Gaza,” said Netanyahu in the Knesset plenum on Monday. “It had reservations about entering Gaza City, Khan Younis, and, most critically, strongly opposed entry into Rafah.” …

“The US had reservations and suggested that we not enter Gaza,” said Netanyahu in the Knesset plenum on Monday. “It had reservations about entering Gaza City, Khan Younis, and, most critically, strongly opposed entry into Rafah.” …

Netanyahu also criticized US positions after Iran’s drone and missile attacks on Israel: “Again, we were told by our friend that there is no need to respond. And I said that sitting and not reacting is not acceptable, and we responded.”

For those who don’t recall, Gates served both George W. Bush and Barack Obama as Defense Secretary. In his memoir Duty, Gates wrote that then-VP Biden has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.” Biden has spent the last three-plus years proving Gates’ point, especially in his disgraceful rout out of Kabul and abandonment of 14,000 Americans to the Taliban. But Biden’s attempts to play general in Israel’s war against Iran and its proxies since the October 7 massacres provides ample proof of Gates’ insight as well. 

Netanyahu didn’t just decide to pop off for no reason, either. Biden sent Amos Hochstein back to Jerusalem to wave a piece of paper proclaiming peace in our time a cease-fire with Hezbollah. Supposedly Hezbollah claims it will comply with UN Security Council Resolution 1701:

Both Israel and Lebanon have seen a US proposal for a ceasefire, which is based on the implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the Second Lebanon War in 2006 but which was never fully implemented.

That resolution bans the operation of armed non-state actors such as Hezbollah in southern Lebanon between the Litani River and Israel’s northern border. 

A ceasefire agreement is expected to have an implementation mechanism to ensure that Hezbollah can not re-arm and is likely to create a wider buffer zone such that Hezbollah would be behind the Litani River.

That had an “implementation mechanism” in 2006, too. The United Nations promised to use its UNIFIL peacekeeping force to keep Hezbollah away from the Israel border, and then promptly refused to do anything when Hezbollah violated its terms. Israel has insisted that they be allowed to “implement” 1701 for themselves until Lebanon fields an army that can suppress Hezbollah, terms that thus far haven’t yet been met. 

Netanyahu made it clear that Israel intends to enforce 1701 themselves no matter what Biden and Hochstein gin up:

Netanyahu also indicated that Israel would need to continue to operate militarily against the Iran-backed Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, even if a ceasefire deal is reached in Lebanon.

“The most important thing is not [the deal that] will be laid on paper,” Netanyahu said. “Even if there is a paper [setting out an agreement], worthy though it may be, we will be required, in order to ensure our security in the north (of Israel), to systematically carry out operations — not only against Hezbollah’s attacks, which could come. Even if there is a ceasefire, nobody can guarantee it will hold. So it’s not only our reaction, a preventive reaction, a reaction in the wake of attack, but also the capacity to prevent Hezbollah from strengthening.”

“We will not allow Hezbollah to return to the state it was in on October 6, 2023,” he stressed.

That’s not going to get Hochstein or Biden their Neville Chamberlain moment, which is the point Netanyahu is making today. Hezbollah has no intention of disarming and becoming a purely political party in Lebanon. Iran is only playing for time and hoping that both Israel and the US get tired of the war and let Hezbollah reconstitute itself under cover of UNSCR 1701. Netanyahu knows that, even if Biden, Blinken, and Hochstein don’t.

In fact, as Adam Kredo reported yesterday, Biden and his team still don’t know who the villains actually are:

The Biden-Harris administration on Monday unveiled sweeping new sanctions on Israeli Jews, just days after it awarded another $230 million in taxpayer funds to the Palestinians. The back-to-back announcements signal that diplomatic relations between Israel and the outgoing White House will continue to sour until President-elect Donald Trump retakes office next year.

The new sanctions are the broadest to date, imposing unprecedented punitive measures on three Israeli organizations the administration accuses of fomenting violence against Palestinians in the West Bank. They were leveled just days after a coalition of nearly 90 congressional Democrats petitioned the Biden administration to ramp up sanctions on Israel before leaving the White House.

The sanctions were announced just three days after the Biden-Harris administration awarded another $230 million in funding for humanitarian projects in the West Bank and the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. The American government has now sent more than $2 billion in taxpayer funds to the Palestinians since Hamas’s Oct. 7 terror spree on Israel—even as critics warn this cash is keeping Hamas on life support.

It’s just ongoing proof of the wisdom of Robert Gates. 

The latest episode of The Ed Morrissey Show podcast is now up! Today’s show features:

•  Has Trump decided to “terminate woke” — and will his Cabinet get the job done?
• Andrew Malcolm and I go over the new Trump team, and the media’s bizarre reactions to it. 
• Why did Morning Joe’s hosts decide to kiss the ring at Mar-a-Lago after painting Trump as an existential threat? And does Trump have a “mandate”? 

The Ed Morrissey Show is now a fully downloadable and streamable show at  Spotify, Apple Podcasts, the TEMS Podcast YouTube channel, and on Rumble and our own in-house portal at the #TEMS page!