Apr 14, 2024
- Iran launched a drone strike on Israel despite warnings from the Biden administration.
- The attack shows how much the US has lost control of the conflict in Gaza, a military expert said.
- The Biden administration wants to be “firefighters in a raging house fire,” he told BI.
Iran’s barrage of attacks against Israel represents a stark reminder of how the US has been unable to ameliorate tensions in the Middle East and contain the ongoing conflict in Gaza, a national security and foreign policy expert told Business Insider.
On Saturday, Iran launched missiles and drones against Israel in what officials from Iran described as retaliation for the airstrike on the country’s consulate in Syria nearly two weeks ago. The airstrike killed two Iranian generals and five officers, the Associated Press reported.
The US anticipated that Iran would strike back, but it was only a matter of when and how. President Joe Biden told reporters on Friday that he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later.”
The president also re-affirmed US support for Israel and had a simple, brief message to Iran: “Don’t.”
Iran’s brazen dismissal of Biden’s warning may be the result of a series of inconsistent strategic moves from the US with its handling of the Israel-Gaza war, Sean McFate, a national security and foreign policy expert at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship & Public Affairs, told Business Insider.
‘No strategic competence’
McFate told BI that Iran’s retaliation was a way to show the international stage that the country had a backbone after Israel’s airstrike in Damascus. But, more broadly, Saturday’s attack shows just how effective Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel was at stoking chaos in the Middle East, McFate said.
Hamas “launched this as a way to disrupt the melting of relations between Israel and the Gulf states,” McFate said, referring to how diplomatic relations between Israel and Arab countries had been thawing before the war. Biden similarly stated that Hamas was trying to disrupt his administration’s efforts to normalize ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia, as well as with others in the region, The Washington Post reported.
With the war in Gaza, the US wedged itself into the battle and has so far shown conflicting messages to the world through its military support for Israel and simultaneous humanitarian aid for Gaza, leaving Gulf countries such as Iran to feel more defensive, the expert said.
“The fact that the Biden administration is both arming Israel and sending aid to Gaza shows the world that the Biden team has no strategic competence,” McFate said. “They’ve already lost control.”
McFate pointed to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war as another example of one of the Biden administration’s strategic misfires.
Throughout the 2024 election cycle, Biden has said that the US must maintain its support for Ukraine against Russian aggression. But the president’s support for Israel runs counter to the reasons he said the US should support Ukraine.
“The administration wants to be the firefighters in a raging house fire,” McFate said. “But I think for them to do that, they need to extend more leverage on the government of Israel by conditioning further military support. Israel has basically said, ‘Drop off your munitions. Don’t answer the door. Just leave,’ like your Uber driver. I think the administration has been a little too timid in how to deal with Israel.”
In recent weeks, US support for Israel showed some signs of wavering as Biden called for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza during a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to the White House.
In a Saturday statement after Iran’s strikes, Biden condemned the attacks and said he had spoken with Netanyahu over the phone to say that the US remains steadfast in its support for Israel.
“I’ve just spoken with Prime Minister Netanyahu to reaffirm America’s ironclad commitment to the security of Israel,” Biden said. “I told him that Israel demonstrated a remarkable capacity to defend against and defeat even unprecedented attacks — sending a clear message to its foes that they cannot effectively threaten the security of Israel.”
However, in the same call, Biden told the prime minister that the US will oppose a counterattack against Iran, a senior White House official told CNN.
A White House spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
“McFate pointed to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war as another example of one of the Biden administration’s strategic misfires.”
Indeed, Biden and his team have no strategic competence. The administration has screwed up at every step of the way. It left itself wide open to attack by other strategic mistakes; not educating the American people over the importance of letting Ukraine win and mafia land lose, letting the maga gangsters have the stage, and creating a deplorable border situation.
The Afghanistan disaster had already shown us and the world that this is the wrong administration at the wrong time. It might be okay as a fair weather administration, but it’s definitely not a good one for these hard times.
What you expect from old sacks with fossil brains? Biden and Trump are lucky if they find their way home without GPS.
GPS? They wouldn’t know how to use that. Without a human guide, they’d be lost, like many 75+ year olds who venture too far from their nursery homes. 🙄
Or take a pee without ejecting their large intestine.
As the article states, the Iranian drone strike was an act of retaliation. Despite the US being Israel’s major and irreplacable arms supporter, Biden couldn’t prevent Natanyahu from triggering this very much unnecessary and counterproductive escalation with Iran. More proof of the lack of foreign policy competence of the President. Questionable values, irrational priorities and political helplessness lead to one failure after another, make the US look pathetically clumsy on the global stage. It’s really embarassing. 😖
“Natanyahu[‘s] unnecessary and counterproductive escalation with Iran.”
Interesting take from Jay Kuo:
“Here’s where it becomes quite thorny. Israel has a right to defend itself against an aggressive Iran bent on Israel’s destruction. But if it directly attacks Iranian soil or sovereignty (like an embassy compound), that risks a huge escalation of the conflict. ”
“Add to this the fact that Netanyahu is battling to save his political career. He is deeply unpopular at home, and there have been widespread calls and street protests calling for early elections. Bibi has rebuffed these calls, saying that to do so in the middle of the war would prove destabilizing. But that means that so long as the war drags on, Netanyahu can justify his staying in power. And if Israel is under direct attack by Iran, that could cause the Israeli people to rally around the flag and his continued leadership.”
“These considerations make it very difficult to parse whether Israel is acting legitimately in its own defense or whether Netanyahu is deliberately provoking a broader conflict in order to sow chaos, which serves him politically.”
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And not just to save his political career. There’s an ongoing felony corruption case. Bibi needs to stay in power in order to stay out of jail. Sound like anyone else we know?
Yup, Larry, Netanyahu wants to start one war after another, in order to keep the country on itsctoes. He knows that once people have time to think clearly, they’ll force new elections. He’s fighting for his political survival and to stay out of jail, he’s literally walking over dead bodies for this. Evidently, he’s a major sociopath. 👿
What is annoying about this episode, is the US and UK authorising their airforce to intercept any Iranian drones and missiles within range, while they just look on as mafia land tries to destroy Ukraine. It’s a fucking disgraceful act of hypocrisy.
It makes matters even worse when mafia planes, drones and missiles violate NATO airspace and all we get are lame excuses and finger waving.
You would think Poland would tell the orcs, anything flying within 20km of the Polish borders will be taken as a threat to our security and will be shot down. That would be something, at least, but we can’t even get that.
I have come to the conclusion that the Poles have bigger mouths than their courage can cover.
Either that or they are getting instructions not to do anything that might be deemed as a threat to mafia land.
Anything is possible when you are dealing with marshmallows. They easily drip or combust when you hold them too close to the fire.
John Kirby, a spokesman for the U.S. National Security Council, urged House Speaker Mike Johnson to allow a vote on a bipartisan aid bill for Israel, Ukraine and other national security uses. “Our message to the speaker is: Get that on the floor. Let’s get it voted on so that that aid can get to Israel, to Ukraine, in the fastest possible way and not have to go back to the Senate for more negotiating,” he said.
Hamas “launched this as a way to disrupt the melting of relations between Israel and the Gulf states.”
That, and also as a way to distract the West from what’s going on in Ukraine – which helps Hamas’ benefactor, Russia.
“the US wedged itself into the battle and has so far shown conflicting messages to the world through its military support for Israel and simultaneous humanitarian aid for Gaza”
There’s not really a conflict. We can support Israel’s security, and efforts to destroy the terrorist organization Hamas, while also aiding innocent Palestinians who are not part of Hamas and are suffering because Hamas uses them as human shields.
I don’t think the U.S. ever had control over the conflict in Gaza.
^bert
Well, depends how you define “control”, Bert, but past presidents like Reagan and Clinton did apply much more pressure on Israel, when necessary. Biden’s simply a sentimental, stubborn fool with an unexplainable sympathy for Netanyahu. The old fox Bibi plays him like a fiddle. 🙄
We have to keep focused on the fact that Biden is a total loser when it comes to foreign policy. He’s only a fraction better in domestic policies.