It’s no secret that Israel is reliant on U.S. military assistance, which is crucial when considering the region in which the Jewish state is situated. But Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu of Israel announced late last month his plans for Israel to cut reliance on U.S. military aid.
Lots of luck with that idea. Israel is the recipient of billions of dollars in U.S. military aid and is in no position to take on the responsibility to fill such a void in the event of scaling back aid packages. Netanyahu proposes a transformation of the Israel-U.S. relationship from one of reliance to one of partnership, insisting Israel take up a role as a source of military aid for the United States. Israel is advanced in weapons systems. But it’s hardly ready to be a mutual source of military aid to the United States.
Yet whereas Netanyahu’s idea of Israel being the source of military aid for the United States is laughable, the context in which he announced it is galling. Netanyahu implied that the Biden administration is responsible for casualties suffered by Israel in the Gaza war, specifically to casualties in the southern region of Gaza where swaths of Palestinian refugees were situated.
It’s true that former President Joe Biden called a pause in military assistance regarding Israel’s mission in southern Gaza. The truth is that Israel’s target in southern Gaza was human, as opposed to strategic. Scarcely any observer of the conflict disagrees with the assessment that Israel’s retaliation in Gaza has been excessive, notwithstanding the clear act of war Hamas had initiated in the attack on the Jewish state in 2023.
Irony is too tame a word to describe Netanyahu’s ingratitude. But it’s certainly ironic that Netanyahu would implicate Biden for the spectacle of Israeli casualties when there are those within Israel itself who blame Netanyahu for Israel not being prepared for the 2023 Hamas attack.
These dynamics are not unprecedented in Israel. In the wake of the Yom Kippur War in 1973, during which Egypt and Syria launched a devastating attack on Israel which exposed the Jewish state’s vulnerability, inquiries were conducted in the Knesset (Israel’s parliament) blaming Prime Minister Golda Meir for an intelligence breakdown.
And there was an intelligence breakdown. It would be revealed that King Hussein of Jordan had provided information to Israel that Egypt and Syria were planning an attack. In 1967, King Hussein had only joined Egypt and Syria with reluctance during the Six Day War (which left Israel with expanded control over the West Bank, Gaza, and the Golan Heights). His tacit alliance with Israel was the worst kept secret in the Middle East.
But notwithstanding the intelligence breakdown in 1973, Israel had been doing its best in trying to read Egyptian and Syrian intentions. What the Yom Kippur War exposed was not Israel’s negligence, but its vulnerability. Meir had no choice in accepting blame for an intelligence breakdown lest the surrounding Arab states would figure the Jewish state to be vulnerable again for yet another combined attack. It was essential that Israel’s neighbors not grasp that Israel’s vulnerability was eternal.
This same eternal vulnerability was exposed by the attack on Israel by Hamas in 2023. To blame Netanyahu for the attack is a matter of politics more than principle. But Netanyahu, who has a well earned reputation as a shameless politician, is just as irresponsible (if not more so) for implicating Biden (in an obvious effort to endear himself to President Donald Trump).
In his years in the U.S. Senate, as vice president, and finally as president, Joe Biden proved himself to be a good friend to the Jewish state. He was especially supportive in the wake of the Hamas attack on Israel in 2023, having visited Israel at the time and declaring himself a Zionist in solidarity with the Jewish state.
To blame Biden for casualties suffered by Israel in the Gaza war is treacherous on Netanyahu’s part. Were Trump an honorable leader, he would denounce Netanyahu’s unwarranted attack on Biden. But Netanyahu and Trump are kindred spirits. Neither extends a high priority to honor.
John O’Neill is an Allen Park freelance writer and a graduate of Wayne State University.
