President Joe Biden must avoid becoming President Joe Chump

Israel’s recent bombing of Iran’s embassy in Syria marks a major shift from its usual policy of targeting only military sites. This provocative act by Netanyahu, amid domestic issues, seems a ploy to retain power and avoid prosecution, posing a significant risk for Joe Biden and the United States.

T he Merriam-Webster dictionary defines the word chump as “a person who is easily tricked”. Last week a Middle East action noted in mainstream media but barely discussed, took place, and based on President Joe Biden’s reaction to it some might think he is beginning to look like President Joe Chump.

— Definition of the word chump.

On April 1st, April Fool’s Day, Israel did a foolish but calculated thing when it bombed Iran’s embassy complex in Syria; the bomb killed seven Iranian military advisers. Among them was Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a popular senior commander in the Quds Force, Iran’s elite foreign espionage and paramilitary arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). According to Iran’s ambassador to Syria, Hossein Akbari, “This is perhaps the first time that the Zionist regime allows itself to attack an official building of the Islamic Republic of Iran embassy, which had the flag of the Islamic Republic raised on top of it.”

In the past, Israel has carried out attacks on Iranian military installations or the hide-outs of Iranian-backed terrorists, but the April 1 bombing was the first time Israel has struck against Iranian diplomats. It is normal procedure for countries to limit their attacks, regardless of the reason for their attack, to military targets that avoid diplomatic targets unless a state of war exists between the two countries.

Before Israel’s abnormal strike against an Iranian diplomatic target, their foreign policy, as far as embassies were concerned, was thought to be the same as America’s. According to the U.S. State Department embassies and consulates have a special status, the immediate area around an embassy and the embassy itself belongs to the country it represents, and no one including representatives of the host country can enter an embassy without permission. Therefore an attack on an embassy is considered an attack on the country it represents.

“U.S. embassies and consulates abroad, as well as foreign countries’ embassies and consulates in the United States, have a special status. While the host government is responsible for the security of U.S. diplomats and the area around an embassy, the embassy itself belongs to the country it represents. Representatives of the host country cannot enter an embassy without permission. An attack on an embassy is considered an attack on the country it represents.”

Emphasis on “is considered an attack on the country it represents”. Because that’s exactly the message Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intended to send to Iran. It’s the closest thing to officially declaring war on Iran that Netanyahu could do since Israel’s Constitution prevents an Israeli Prime Minister from unilaterally declaring war, and the last thing the Israeli Knesset would logically do is declare war on Iran while the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are currently at war with Hamas in Gaza. Ordinarily, an uncompromised Prime Minister, thinking of Israel’s best interest, would not invite aggression from a country not at war with Israel while Israel is conducting a war to defeat Hamas.

Unfortunately for Israel, Netanyahu is both criminally and politically compromised. Long before the vicious Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel, Netanyahu was criminally compromised. In 2019 he was criminally indicted for breach of trust, accepting bribes, and fraud. When Netanyahu’s predecessor, convicted felon former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, was indicted for bribery and corruption he resigned, not only did Netanyahu refuse to resign he formed a new government with Israel’s conservative ultra-right-wing to remain in power and avoid prosecution. In other words, as long as Netanyahu is Prime Minister of Israel, he can avoid serving prison time.

— President Joe Biden participates in a bilateral meeting with PM of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu in New York City.

In the aftermath of the most violent attack on Jews since the Holocaust, facts have emerged that make Netanyahu politically compromised. Weeks before the deadly Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the head of Israel’s Mossad arrived in Doha, Qatar, for a meeting with Qatari officials. In that meeting, the government of Qatar asked the head of Israel’s national intelligence agency if it should keep sending millions of dollars a month into the Gaza Strip to prop up the Hamas government there. Since Netanyahu had recently decided to continue his decade-old policy of allowing money to flow to Hamas, Mossad chief David Barnea replied yes. Israel welcomed Qatar to continue to fund a group that Israel itself considers to be a terrorist organization.

This amazing fact becomes a mind-blowing fact when you consider the additional fact that the same Mossad chief obtained a copy of the Hamas battle plan, which accurately detailed how Hamas would attack Israel one year before the October massacre occurred. The most devastating facts materialized on the day of the attack when (1) it took hours for the IDF to respond to the Hamas attack because (2) Israel never developed a battle response plan to an attack by Hamas.

According to Netanyahu, Israel cannot provide answers to these questions or provide any humanitarian relief to innocent non-Hamas Palestinians in Gaza, because Israel’s priority has to be 100% focused on the war to remove Hamas from Gaza, and on protecting Israel from possible attack by other terrorist groups in the Middle East. And yet, in the middle of Israel’s supposedly 100% focus on removing Hamas from Gaza and protecting itself during this period of vulnerability to possible attack from other terrorist groups, Netanyahu decides to violate international rules of conduct by committing an Israeli attack on the diplomatic embassy complex of Iran, a country that has not attacked Israel.

As long as Israel is at war with Hamas, Netanyahu remains Prime Minister and out of prison. A recent poll showed only 15% of Israelis wanted Netanyahu to remain Prime Minister after the Hamas war is over, and a pro-Netanyahu newspaper Israel Hayom has reversed positions and published an impassioned plea for Netanyahu’s resignation, calling on him to “lead us to victory and then go”, so the only way for Netanyahu to keep his political power and remain out of prison is if Israel is at war, and the only way for Israel to be at war is if America continues to supply Israel the weapons necessary to fight a war.

— President Joe Biden speaks on the phone with Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu.

That’s why Netanyahu knew precisely what he was doing when he attacked Iran’s embassy, and if President Biden falls for Netanyahu’s obvious war ploy to stay out of prison and maintain his political power, Netanyahu will succeed in transforming President Joe Biden into President Joe Chump.

It’s no coincidence that after America’s top elected Jewish politician, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Democrat Chuck Schumer, called for new elections in Israel to replace Netanyahu, a growing list of House and Senate Democrats have pressured President Biden to either condition or stop military aid to Israel, and a growing number of Democrat voters have voted uncommitted in Democrat primaries to express their disagreement with Biden’s Israel policy that Netanyahu decided, with no provocation, to commit an act of war by attacking the sovereign territory of Iran, a country that has not attacked Israel, hoping to provoke Iran into responding in war-like fashion against Israel, thereby forcing President Biden to not only continue to provide Israel unconditional military aid but to increase the military aid that’s provided.

Israel falsely projects itself as a first-world country, in reality, Israel lives economically above its means because of both American government and American Jewish citizen aid, and Israel can’t conduct a war for longer than two weeks without both direct American economic and military aid. So when Netanyahu says regardless of what America thinks or says, Israel will conduct war when and where it likes, it’s all Israeli words that can’t be backed up with Israeli action unless America supplies the money and weapons to do so.

America is and always should be fiercely Zionist, but that does not mean that Netanyahu can be allowed to make America and President Biden his or Israel’s chump. America’s appropriate iron-clad commitment to always preserve and defend a safe place for Jews to live in peace and prosperity cannot be twisted to empower or allow Israel freedom to enforce apartheid living conditions on its Palestinian neighbors. Nor should it allow Prime Minister Netanyahu to provoke war with a country that has not attacked Israel solely to generate a reaction from the attacked country that forces America to provide an unlimited supply of military aid to Israel, which then enables Netanyahu to keep creating war havoc in the Middle East just to achieve his two goals of avoiding prison and maintaining personal political power.

President Biden, please don’t allow Netanyahu to make you President Joe Chump.

GOING FURTHER:

• ‘Buying Quiet’: Inside the Israeli Plan That Propped Up Hamas | New York Times

• Israel Knew Hamas’s Attack Plan More Than a Year Ago | New York Times

• Where Was the Israeli Military When Hamas Attacked? | New York Times

• Only 15% of Israelis want Netanyahu to keep job after Gaza war, poll finds | Reuters

• Netanyahu, lead us to victory and then go | Israel Hayom

• Chuck Schumer calls for new elections in Israel, breaking with Benjamin Netanyahu | NPR

Sources:

▪ This piece was first published in Isaac Newton Farris Jr’s blog and re-published in PUBLIC SQUARE UK on 11 April 2024 under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. | The author writes in a personal capacity.

▪ Cover: Flickr/White House. (Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.)