Biden’s military support fuels Netanyahu’s aggression, ignoring ceasefire prospects

US President Joe Biden has dispatched a squadron of fighter planes and a carrier group of warships to this region to protect Israel if Iran and its allies retaliate militarily to the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and Hizbollah military strategist Fuad Shukr in Beirut. The USS Abraham Lincoln, which is currently deployed in the western Pacific, is to replace the USS Theodore Roosevelt which was on a short-term assignment to the Gulf of Oman.

The Biden administration’s announcement of the naval redeployments is meant to demonstrate that the US is ready, willing and able to protect Israel from retribution. However, while the warplanes can be in place in coming days, as it will take time for Lincoln to reach regional waters and take over from Roosevelt, arsonists could have lit the flames of all-out war before the alternate carrier group arrives.

It is ironic that this intervention is on the orders of lame duck Biden who told Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu that Washington would be making these “new defensive deployments” to reinforce Israel when Israel sparked the expected round of tit-for-tat strikes by assassinating Haniyeh and Shukr. Biden should deploy planes and ships to defend Iran and Lebanon from Israeli pyrotechnicians aimed at launching the regional war Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has long yearned to fight.

Israel does not need US warplanes and ships. Israel has been built up by the US and its Western proxies Britain, France and Germany over decades to become the regional superpower and military hegemon and the only country in the region to have an arsenal of nuclear weapons. This process has involved the sharing of weapons technologies, investment in Israel’s military industries, and a constant flow of arms to Israel.

Unhindered by external constraints, Israel’s total war on Gaza has demonstrated that Israel has the means and intention to create wastelands which cannot sustain life for their populations. Netanyahu has threatened to turn Beirut into another Gaza. His threat must be taken seriously.

Antagonists face physical the existential limitations when dealing with Israel. Israel’s sole state- level antagonist, Iran is no match for Israel. Iran’s economy has been hobbled and revenue from oil exports limited by sanctions. While Iran has a formidable arsenal of domestically manufactured ballistic missiles and drones, Tehran does not appear to have anti-missile systems to protect the country from attack by Israel. Iran’s allies — Lebanon’s Hizbollah, Yemen’s Houthis, and Iraq’s Shiite militias are non-state actors which depend on Iran for arms. Hizbollah’s military wing is the most professional and is armed with tens of thousands of missiles and drones. However, the movement has to carefully calibrate retaliation against Israel. Crisis-ridden Lebanon cannot afford another war with Israel like the 2006 conflict. This is true for Houthis and Iraqi militias as well. Hamas relies on homemade weapons and rockets and arms smuggled from Egypt.

Senator (1973-2009), Vice President (2009-2017), and President (2021 until now) Biden has contributed to the policy of ensuring Israel has the “edge” over any coalition of antagonists, This should mean that the US would not have to go to war to defend Israel and/or its illegal occupation of East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza.

Since the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel, Biden has given Netanyahu all the political and military support he has needed to prosecute the war on Gaza, crush Palestinian resistance in the West Bank, and sustain Israel in its cross-border exchanges with Israel.

In response to the attack on Israel by Hamas which killed 1,139 and abducted 250, Biden ordered naval and air forces to deploy in the region. He paid a 31-hour visit to Israel on October 18th where he reiterated the “iron clad” US commitment to Israel, promised Israel billions of dollars in arms and $100 million in aid to the Palestinians. He said Israel’s response to the attack should be proportionate although Israeli strikes had already killed 3,400 Gazans. He urged Israel and Egypt to facilitate the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza. Netanyahu turned a deaf ear to Biden. Today the death toll in Gaza is 40,000 and climbing and Gazans are deprived by Israel of food, water, medical supplies and fuel.

Biden planned to travel to Amman to meet with His Majesty King Abdullah, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas but this was called off by the Arab leaders after the Israeli army was accused of bombing al-Ahli hospital near Gaza City and killed scores of civilians sheltering there.

Since then, there have been scores of Israeli strikes on ambulances, medical workers, hospitals and Palestinians who have taken refuge at hospitals but no reaction from Biden who continues to provide Israel with the arms to prosecute its war and refuses to sanction Israel in any way for war crimes and crimes against humanity. During the first eight months of Israel’s disproportionate onslaught on Gaza Biden used the US veto in the UN Security Council to block a ceasefire. On May 31, Biden finally put forward a ceasefire plan which he claimed originated with Israel. While Hamas has accepted the plan, Netanyahu has added conditions unacceptable to Hamas to scupper a ceasefire. By killing Hamas negotiator Haniyeh, Netanyahu has demonstrated his refusal to ceasefire.

Biden is an accomplice in Israel’s crimes by providing Netanyahu with the means to wage war and failing to use Washington’s considerable leverage to restrain him. Under Netanyahu and Israel’s most right-wing government, all-out war has been unleashed on the Palestinians and threatens the region with spill over. By deploying US military assets in the wake of the Haniyeh and Shukr assassinations, Biden has encouraged unrestrained Netanyahu to wage war instead of agreeing to a ceasefire which could avert regional conflagration.