Biden’s Gaza Dilemma
Some Democrats are threatening to sit November out.
Driving in to work this morning, I listened to the latest episode of the NYT The Daily podcast, “The Voters Willing to Abandon Biden Over Gaza.” It focused on organizers trying to get people voting in Michigan’s Democratic primary to select “uncommitted” as a signal to the President that his support of Israel in what they call a “genocide” against Palestinians is unacceptable.
It was frustratingly anecdotal, focusing especially on one woman, an elderly Palestinian woman married to a Jew who has lived here for decades and worked in Democratic campaigns going back at least as far as 1992. And, indeed, focused on Michigan in particular because it has an unusually large Muslim and Arab population. The thought was that, if they were to mostly sit it out, Trump could very well win the state that he narrowly lost to Biden in 2020 and actually won in 2016.
The fact that Trump is markedly worse on Palestinian and Muslim issues from the perspective of these activists was acknowledged. But they just didn’t care: they can’t support him.
Which, I guess, is fine. People have a right to be single-issue voters if they want to.
I listened to this after having scanned the news earlier, including reports like this the AP‘s “Israel is ready to pause its war in Gaza during Ramadan if a hostage deal is reached, Biden says.”
Israel would be willing to pause its war on Hamas in Gaza during the upcoming Muslim holy month of Ramadan if a deal is reached to release some of the hostages held by the militants, U.S. President Joe Biden said.
Negotiators from the United States, Egypt and Qatar have been working to broker a cease-fire deal that would see Hamas free some of the dozens of hostages it holds in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners and a six-week halt in fighting. During the pause, talks would continue over the release of the remaining hostages and additional Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
Israeli officials said Biden’s comments on a late-night talk show filmed Monday came as a surprise and were not made in coordination with the country’s leadership. A Hamas official played down any sense of progress, saying the group wouldn’t soften its demands.
Negotiations were still underway Tuesday in Qatar. A senior official from Egypt has said the draft deal includes the release of up to 40 women and older hostages in return for up to 300 Palestinian prisoners — mostly women, minors and older people.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the negotiations, said the proposed six-week pause in fighting would allow hundreds of trucks to bring desperately needed aid into Gaza every day, including to the hard-hit north.
The start of Ramadan, which is expected to be around March 10, is seen as an unofficial deadline for a cease-fire deal. The month is a time of heightened religious observance and dawn-to-dusk fasting for hundreds of millions of Muslims around the world. Israeli-Palestinian tensions have flared in the past during the holy month.
“Ramadan’s coming up and there has been an agreement by the Israelis that they would not engage in activities during Ramadan as well, in order to give us time to get all the hostages out,” Biden said in an appearance on NBC’s “Late Night With Seth Meyers.”
In separate comments Monday, Biden said that he hoped a cease-fire deal could take effect by next week.
At the same time, Biden did not call for an end to the war, which was triggered by the deadly Hamas attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, when militants killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted roughly 250 people, according to Israeli authorities.
The Israeli officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss the sensitive talks with the media, said Israel wants a deal immediately, but that Hamas continues to push excessive demands. They also said that Israel is insisting that female soldiers be part of the first group of hostages released under any truce deal.
Hamas official Ahmad Abdel-Hadi indicated that optimism on a deal was premature.
“The resistance is not interested in giving up any of its demands, and what is proposed does not meet what it had requested,” he told the Pan-Arab TV channel Al Mayadeen.
Hamas has previously demanded that Israel end the war as part of any deal, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called “delusional.”
Biden, who has shown staunch support for Israel throughout the war, left open the door in his remarks for an eventual Israeli ground offensive in the city of Rafah in southern Gaza, on the border with Egypt, where more than half of the enclave’s 2.3 million people have fled under Israeli evacuation orders.
The prospect of an invasion of Rafah has prompted global alarm over the fate of civilians trapped there. Netanyahu has said a ground operation in Rafah is an inevitable component of Israel’s strategy for crushing Hamas. This week, the military submitted for Cabinet approval operational plans for the offensive, as well as evacuation plans for civilians there.
The degree to which Biden has influence over Netanyahu is unclear, but I strongly suspect that it’s marginal. Israel has a coalition government running the war effort and there’s not much demand for moderation. And, while I’m sure they’d like to get more hostages back, it’s not obvious why they would agree to give Hamas a long respite in exchange for them.
American public opinion is hard to read.
Here’s a Gallup poll released in early January, the latest on their site:
Only a tiny number of Democrats thought we were doing “too much” and 40 percent thought we were doing “not enough.” This would seem a pretty good indicator that Biden’s policy is popular.
Framed slightly differently, though—in terms of Israel’s actions—we see radically different numbers in an AP-NORC poll taken the month before and the month after:
Here, we see something of a flip. Clearly, Democrats are more anti-Israel than either Independents or Republicans. But all three groups are slowly turning against Israel, with only Republicans majority favorable.
Sitting out the election and helping handing it to Trump is guaranting more severe collective punishment, ethnic cleansing for the Palestinians expansion in West Bank, a package of results that are objectively worse outcome for the Palestinians.
This is pure self-indulgent vanity preening and self-congratulorty empty posturing.
Sheer idiocy.
A couple of thoughts (as I was already thinking about this because NPR did a similar story this morning).
1. When the entire political system is oriented around the presidency, this kind of situation is one in which many feel this is their only chance to send any kind of signal.
2. How they behave in a no-stakes primary v. the general election are two different things (even if they are telling themselves right now that they won’t vote in November).
3. A lot of this is also the media trying to find something to talk about in an otherwise largely pointless primary (insofar as the results are essentially known).
4. It will be instructive to watch how the media reports any “none of the above” votes on the Dem side. Will they cast an otherwise massive Biden victory as signs of disunity of disarray?
@Lounsbury:
BINGO!
Id have a bit more respect for the “uncommitted voters” if they’d at least pretend to be outraged over what Hamas did. It’s 100% Israel, Israel, Israel.
Idiots.
This. Look, elections have consequences. With Biden out of the way, we’d see a Trump-backed Netanyahu release yet unseen horrors on Palestinians and the mideast more broadly. But if it’s to be, it’s to be. FAFO.
Who’da thunk we’d see Netanyahu and Rashida Tlaib in agreement? Extremism makes strange befellows.
I get that “anti-Israel” here is used in the casual and non-literal sense, but for clarity: thinking Israel’s response to 7 Oct has gone too far and is destructive and counterproductive does not make one anti-Israel. It was not anti-American to feel indiscriminate US warmongering in response to 9/11 was beyond the pale.
Some Israelis are again in the streets protesting Netanyahu’s conduct, including 7 Oct survivors and loved ones. They are not anti-Israel.
@Steven L. Taylor:
If past is prologue, any result will be flogged as a disaster for Biden.
In 2012, Michigan Democrats overwhelmingly endorsed Obama’s re-election, but “uncommitted” received over 20,000 votes, about 10%. No one noticed or cared.
So we’ll have a point of reference, for the media’s coming lunacy.
Doubt the MI Palestinians will vote for Trump. Heard a clip of him bragging about making Jerusalem the capital of Israel. That’s not quite the quote, he was having a Trump moment and bragged about making Israel the capital of Israel.
@DK:
‘Anti-Israel’ is used in the sense that no one ever, ever suggests that the whole war would end if Hamas surrendered. We don’t even get the obligatory throat-clearing. That’s the tell. Because Hamas could actually end the war right now. So yes, progressives are objectively anti-Israel.
I continue to think that Biden is going down two paths, hoping for one outcome but preparing the country for the other: Israel commits to a meaningful peace process vs. Israel goes full pre-de Klerk South Africa and we gradually walk away.
There was a long piece on NPR the other day about settlers in the West Bank bulldozing Palestinian farms and poisoning their cisterns so they couldn’t come back, then taking the land over to graze their sheep. Some of the Israeli soldiers sent to the area were themselves from the illegal settlements and assisted in the takeover. So, bottom line, this is a fight over land, where neither side will settle for anything less than total victory. There is no credible partner for peace on either side and the US and the rest of the world should but out until, and if, such a partner emerges, on either side. The path we are on will lead to us fighting Iran on Israel’s behalf, sending tens of thousands of American’s to die so racist settlers can go on killing racist Palestinians.
@EddieInCA: That is an entirely different subject.
If the voter is anti-Israel, well so be it. That is at least in some fashion coherent and while you may not like it, not incoherent.
It is moronically precious and real world incoherent to be anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian in a meaningful sense and undertake any action whose practical real effect is to return Trump to the White House and a full empowerment of the ethnic cleansing faction of the Israeli leadership, for a real Nakba II (as a protest action / vote idiocy or order of the self-harming internecine sniping of the 1930s Left and like the Marxists who thought Hitler’s rise to power would bring clarity and working class revolution)
@Michael Reynolds: The war would hardly end if Hamas surrendered as Netanyahu has no such personal interest and his fraction desires to ethnically cleanse West Bank and Gaza. Hamas is as much a product of them as of Gaza. The idea their surrender ends anything is silly superficiality.
@Michael Reynolds: Yes, there are anti-Israel leftwing and rightwing extremists, but my comment was not about them, nor about your signature Progressives Derangement Syndrome.
My comment was about JJ’s quote, “Clearly, Democrats are more anti-Israel than either Independents or Republicans,” in response to a poll question positing whether Israel’s response in Gaza has gone too far.
Americans who agree said response has indeed gone too far — and who include swaths of the entire ideological spectrum as indicated by the polling graph above — are not necessarily anti-Israel.
@Michael Reynolds: “‘Anti-Israel’ is used in the sense that no one ever, ever suggests that the whole war would end if Hamas surrendered.”
Really? Let’s say the leadership of Hamas emerged today waving white flags and leading out the hostages. (And let’s assume the IDF has gotten a refresher course on not shooting people waving white flags…)
Do you really think Bibi is going to declare the war “over”? Knowing that the instant the war ends, so does his government and his immunity from prosecution?
Are the Israelis simply going to withdraw all their troops from the ruins of Gaza? Or will Bibi be screaming that occupation is necessary to keep Hamas from reforming?
Is Israel going to support the birth of a Palestinian state in Gaza, or will they import “settlers” to rebuild the area as Israeli?
Will all the thousands of people who saw their children, their lovers or their parents torn apart by Israeli bombs and guns just shrug and say “hey, we all deserved it because 16 years ago Hamas won an election and thus we are all collectively guilty”? Or will some number of them decide they deserve vengeance or justice?
You’re free to call me “anti-Israel” if you want — it’s certainly less appalling than the scattershot accusations of anti-Semitism for anyone who disagrees with your politics on the issue — but I’d prefer in this case to think I’m anti-stupidity.
And saying “the war will end if Gaza says” is simply stupid –Trump-level stupid. And nowhere near the level of thought you’d give to just about any other issue.
@Lounsbury:
I think that’s nonsense. If Hamas declared peace even Bibi and his nutbag settlers would have no (political) choice but to accept. The IDF is not the Russian Army, they aren’t a tool to be used indiscriminately by some tyrant. The IDF is much more analogous to the US military – highly professional and politically aware, but with the added fact that a large percentage of Israelis have served. Israel is a democracy, the electoral margins are way too close for Bibi to play that game. Indeed it’s the ongoing Hamas rejectionism that empowers the far right. A two-headed beast, Hamas fanatics and Israeli fanatics, a symbiosis.
@wr:
Bibi is not Israel. He’s the PM with a shaky hold on a tiny margin in the Knesset. Let’s walk this through:
1) Bibi is a monster who would happily ethnically cleanse Gaza.
2) But he isn’t doing that now, has indeed reassured Egypt on that score.
3) But if Hamas surrendered then Bibi would do what he isn’t doing now?
That makes zero sense. It is not Hamas’ military power stopping Bibi, it’s the Israeli people. And the assumption you make, that Bibi would and could ethnically cleanse a surrendered Gaza conflates the most extreme elements of Israeli society with the entirety of Israeli society.
@Michael Reynolds:
I think it is more accurate to say Israel is not Bibi, and that’s the problem. IF the problem was Bibi, getting rid of him would help. But in 1995 the religious and nationalist extremists assassinated the last Israeli Prime Minister to have attempted peace, and since that time those extremists have consolidated power. For 30 years Israel has isolated Gaza, kept Hamas in power, and assured there was no hope of a better situation for the Palestinians there. And in the West Bank, Israel has an unbroken 30 year record of driving Palestinians off their land and confiscating it to build settlements. If Netanyahu disappeared in a puff of smoke, there is no reason to believe these policies would change.
Israel is fighting not just to end Hamas, but also to demonstrate to all their ME enemies that they can live in that neighborhood. And they have to prepare for the coming time when US hegemony has waned and the eastern Mediterranean is under the sway of Turkey, Saudi Arabia with Israel an economic center.
In any case, Israel knows that giving into Washington on breeds contempt from Washington by long history
Micheal Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the US:
So everything is against Israel buckling under to Biden’s “influence”.
@Michael Reynolds: “And the assumption you make, that Bibi would and could ethnically cleanse a surrendered Gaza conflates the most extreme elements of Israeli society with the entirety of Israeli society.”
There are lots of gradations between “ending the war” and “ethnic cleansing.” An open-ended occupation would serve Bibi’s needs as well, I suspect.
I am confused about one thing in your argument, though. You have told us multiple times that the people of Gaza deserve whatever the Israelis do to them because Hamas is their elected government, and so they are all party to the massacre. But somehow Israelis are not responsible for the actions of their democratically elected government, even though they have had elections far more recently than 2008.
At this point, it would be fair to say that Israel’s policy concerning the West Bank is to allow the settlers to do anything to Palestinians short of mass murder. Burn them out, bulldoze their trees, kill a few them – no problem, its easy since they have guns while Palestinians are not allowed to have them by law.
This is not just Netanyahu, its the whole cabinet (except for the ones who want to expel them or nuke them). Its laughable to think that Hamas surrendering would change Israel’s policy. Besides their stated goal is to eliminate Hamas, why would anyone surrender when they are promised death?
Anyone who actually believes this is not collective punishment is kidding themself.
@MarkedMan:
There’s not a lot of love for Palestinians in Israel. Absolutely true. However, a July 2023 (pre-Gaza) poll of Israelis, the question was:
Two things to take from that poll. First, as stated the question includes the matter of removing at least some Israeli settlements on the WB. Second, even Israeli Arabs don’t seem entirely sure.
38/43 with 19% undecided? That’s not a united front behind the far right.
Here’s another poll, same time period:
Again, this is a fractured and uncertain response, and interestingly Israeli Arabs are not all that out of step with the Jews. (Note that many Israeli Arabs are Christian, not Muslim.)
These are polls taken before the Hamas attack and would be very different now. But then on September 12, 2001, Americans would have backed very drastic measures. I’d argue that the earlier polls are more indicative of the Israeli position.
This is not a picture of a population prepared to push Gazans into the Sinai. It is a deeply suspicious population, but that is not the same thing.
As for the post-Hamas Netanyahu picture?
That is not a case of Bibi = Israel, or of Israel = Bibi. Benny Gantz is not Bernie Sanders, but he’s not batshit, settler crazy, either. His position has been absolute ‘no’ to giving back the Golan Heights, but no position on a Palestinian state, per se.
One of the reasons I become frustrated when discussing Gaza with my fellow lefties is the lack of imagination, combined with ignorance of the limits of US influence.
We could be looking at genocide. We are not.
We could be looking at 2 million Gazans standing around in the Sinai. We are not.
Had the US abandoned Israel, people with an inflated notion of US influence leap to the frankly absurd conclusion that Israelis would just say, “Oh well, then I guess we have to let Hamas fire missiles at us. Forever.” No, the reality is that absent any outside constraint whatsoever, the reaction would be, “Then we have to settle this our way.” Then you would be looking at 2 million thirsty Gazans in the desert. Israel alone is not kumbaya Israel.
Don’t forget the dogs that don’t bark, as Holmes might have said.
@Michael Reynolds: A poll on the general population of Israel is interesting, but doesn’t seem to translate to actual policy. Israeli governments for 30 years have been building settlements. Whatever the general population of Israel may or may not think, they have been voting for governments who pursue the same policies. US and European leaders who saw what was happening weren’t ever willing to draw a red line, and Isreal leaders have known this all along, and have taken advantage of it. I use the word “advantage” advisedly because I think it is leading to Israel becoming a pariah nation and that is not good for Israeli’s and ultimate the Palestinians, the Middle East, or the world in general
As a political matter, Biden will likely need every vote he can get in the swing states. He is going to need to work to get those votes.
I tend to think the war in Gaza will be long over by the time November comes around, but the aftermath will still linger and could affect people’s votes. If the war ends in the next couple of months, there is plenty of time to mend fences and for the administration to play a constructive role.
I would point out again that despite what many people here wish were the case, it’s a big, diverse country of 330 million, and not everyone is going to subsume their own political priorities to conform to the wishes of partisans, and not everyone subscribes to the “lesser evil” binary voting strategery that partisans demand. Most normal people understand that voting is an affirmation – you are voting FOR a candidate and it’s perfectly rational not to vote FOR a candidate who has done something you think is beyond the pale.
And activists understand perfectly well that you can’t influence a politician’s behavior if you’re constantly supplicating in the interest of being a good utilitarian, “lesser evil” team player. Anyone who will always give up their principles to support something they don’t like as long as the other option is worse doesn’t actually have much in the way of principles.
I’m laying my marker out now because, for the next several months, we’re going to hear the argument that people must support Biden because Trump is worse. What the people making this argument need to understand is that a lot of people reject that framing, and that argument is, therefore, not convincing in the way you think it is.
At the end of the day, you’ve got to persuade people, and telling them that you think they are stupid is not a very effective strategy, IMO.
As for Gaza, the cognitive dissonance and asymmetry continue.
@Andy:
While I agree with your general theme, I think a better way of stating is that while such framing works for a certain segment of voters, Biden will need more than just that segment and must offer additional reasons for other segments.
@MarkedMan: Or the American people “must” face and take ownership of the consequences of our stupidity. I’m tired of coddling political idiots. If we don’t want to be called stupid, we should stop being stupid.
The people whose #1 priority has become protecting Palestinians will be hurt by a Trump-Netanyahu alliance far more than I will. So if they want to f*** around, let them find out.
It’s reminiscent of progressives who refused to back Hillary in 2016 only to spend four ears howling about Trump’s transgressions. Who did they hurt? Hillary? Pfft. She’s living her best life.
Biden will be fine. The onus is on the American people to not screw up in the ballot box, or to reap the consequences. Anyone still acting like there’s some kind of choice here is dumb, and I’ve told more than one of my “pro-Palestine” social media slactivist friends as much to their face. They didn’t die for it, nor did they end the friendship. They know. We need to stop coddling foolishness and be real.
@DK:
I don’t think we have that luxury. Universal suffrage means 70-90% of the actual voters are low information and disengaged. Don’t get me wrong, I’m in favor of universal suffrage, because it works better than the alternatives (in a whole lot of different ways) but the reality is the reality. Them’s the rules of the game and it’s the only game in town.
@Andy:
It also just pisses people off to tell them that the issues they care about don’t matter, and they should settle for medium terrible instead of completely terrible. Pissed off people dig in their feet and stop listening.
Not everyone will react that way, but a significant number. And, with the swing states being as close as they were last time, I don’t think we can afford that.
The people who are organizing the “vote uncommitted” in the primary are doing more to keep the pro-Gaza voters engaged than the people who keep telling them that they are idiots. I don’t think they are doing much, mind you, but…
There’s a time for a lesser of two evils argument — October. Maybe September. Before that, I think it does more harm than good.
How does it end?
I think it’s more likely that the war expands to the West Bank. Or that it becomes the Third or Twelfth Intifada (whatever number we are up to now) and that we continue to see video of atrocities. And I think we would have to chalk that up as a win for Hamas as that was their goal.
And, domestically, we’re going to have a progressive left consuming videos about things like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Hind_Rajab (warning: no graphic footage or audio here, just a dry explanation about a kid trapped in a car with her dead family calling for help, ambulance teams getting killed and then the kid being “found dead” later)
I assume that we are going to see Russia interfering with our elections yet again this year, but it’s not just going to be made up shit about a Biden crime family that just floods the zone with nonsense, but also the very real atrocities in Gaza that split the Democrats’ coalition. No idea how to get around that, but hounding people 8 months out to just accept the atrocities isn’t the way.
Maybe we will get lucky and Trump will demonstrate that he is worse, and we will get video of him on stage talking about building big, beautiful extermination camps — the best extermination camps, here and abroad. And how he was talking with one of his generals, and the general wiped a tear from his eye and said “sir.”
@DK:
I wish I could upvote this comment more than once.
Also see: Nader, Ralph, 2000 Presidential election.
@DK:
I’m reminded of the several women who were shocked, SHOCKED, after their husbands got deported under Trump’s watch after they voted for Trump.
Trump supporter regrets vote after undocumented husband is deported
He voted for Trump. Now he and his wife raise their son from opposite sides of the border
Anyone who, for even a second, thinks that Trump will be better then Biden when it comes to the plight of the Palestiniansis a freaking moron. There is just no comparison. At all. So go ahead. Fvck around. You will find out.
Help with moderation, please.
@Gustopher:
Good thing people aren’t being told “accept the atrocities.” They’re being told Biden is not to blame for the atrocities, that Biden cannot unilaterally stop the atrocities, and that weakening Biden will make the atrocities worse.
Biden could give a national address and say “I call for a ceasefire” and it’s not going to change a damn thing except emboldening Netanyahu to stop listening to Biden’s team altogether and take the restraints completely off.
Just like driving up Hillary’s and Gore’s negatives from the left in 2016 and 200 did not lead to more progressive governance, but instead elevated the far right, deprived the US of what would have been the most pro-woman and pro-environment presidencies ever, and hurt the very people liberals pretend to care about.
Yes, brainwashing stupid and easily-manipulated people to hate Joe Biden with this “Genocide Joe” bullshit 8 months out will come back to haunt the progressive cause in November.
Some kids are without a father today because a servicemen set himself on fire and unlived himself in front of the Israeli embassy. He’s now being hailed as a martyr in some sections of the left. What’s next? Brocialists endorsing suicide bombings?
We should have learned from 2016 that you can’t turn on a dime and unring these bells. But we haven’t, because too many of really are stupid — and lack loved ones willing to tell us bluntly to cut the crap. Thus, we have and will continue to get the government we deserve.
P.S. The Michigan Republican Party is in literal disarray. 16 Republican delegates are to be awarded from today’s primary, but Republicans will allocate their other 39 Michigan delegates from votes held at a party convention on Saturday.
The problem is Republicans are holding two competing conventions:
One led by Michigan Republicans’ election-denier former chair Kristina Karamo — who refuses to step down even after being ousted by a Jan vote.
One by the backers of the replacement chair Pete Hoekstra, the Bushie turned Trumper who merely moderate compared to Karamo’s craziness and who is now officially recognized by the national RNC.
Of course this chaos and the implications for Trump’s chances in the state will receive a sliver of the coverage greeting the Democrats’ “uncommitted” brouhaha.
@Gustopher: It also just pisses people off to tell them that the issues they care about don’t matter, and they should settle for medium terrible instead of completely terrible. Pissed off people dig in their feet and stop listening.
It’s worse than that. They are told to shut up because they’ll ruin everything. And maybe, just maybe after the victory they’ll be listened to. But there is always a caveat, because of course we have to be careful because we might lose the next time out. In other words, just shut up and vote for us because the other guy is worse. Which is true, just as true as it was when black voters had to vote for a racist because he wasn’t as big a racist as the other guy. The difference is that there was light at the end of the tunnel because there were powerful people who were pro-civil rights.
We have a decent number of Democrats who basically say if you are pro-Palestinian you are anti-semitic.
@SenyorDave:
And we have a large number of Democrats who are pro-Palestine who refuse to condemn Hamas.
We also have a large number of Democrats who ARE antisemitic, despite any position they might have on the plight of the Palestinians.
@DK:
When people don’t feel like they are being heard, they make themselves heard. You may not like that, but that’s generally how things have always gone.
And then people start the tone policing nonsense.
Whether or not to set yourself on fire is one of the most important decisions a person can make. As is sitting out an election because neither side is acceptable.
Sometimes a message vote is more important to someone than a tactical vote, and it’s not stupid. Do you vote for 99% Hitler over Hitler? What about 1% Hitler? Probably no and yes. Ok, where’s the line? 70% Trump? 20% Trump?
https://time.com/6821425/israel-embassy-air-force-protest-fire-self-immolation-aaron-bushnell-latest-updates/
I might be a bad person, but I find the “he shouldn’t have been in uniform when setting himself on fire, it’s a violation of the uniform code” argument to be hysterical.
Biden is in a tough spot. He and his team need to find a way to let the pro-Palestinian crowd feel heard and bring them back into the fold, while not pushing others out. He needs to give that flank a reason to cast a tactical vote rather than a message vote. He needs to show that he hears them, and is working towards their goals. Otherwise they will try to make themselves heard at the ballot box.
No one said that being President was easy. But it’s easier than changing human nature.
@SenyorDave:
We have a large number, but I wouldn’t say they’re decent.
Hamas is getting exactly what they wanted — an Israeli invasion that destabilizes the region and Israel’s alliances, while breaking a status quo that had solidified into something unacceptable. Just flipping the chess board.
Will the new status quo be better for the Palestinian people? Probably not. But they or their successors can keep flipping the chess board indefinitely every few years. In fact, the new status quo is likely to be so much worse that desperate people will do more desperate things, and that’s not great for Israel.
Hamas is winning this war.
But it’s probably antisemitism to point this out.
@DK: Biden’s best chance of winning is Republicans completely fucking themselves over. He’s not only not popular on his left flank, but he isn’t acceptable to a significant portion of the left flank.
Against a normal Republican Party, Biden loses bigly. But he’s not running against a normal party or a normal candidate.
Let’s go Republican self-destruction! This isn’t even infighting between MAGA and normal republicans, this is MAGA and other MAGA fighting over grifting opportunities.
@Gustopher:
Good points about the timing of things and when to make certain arguments.
As for Gaza, despite the huge number of deaths and massive destruction in Gaza, the reaction outside of the UN, progressive lefties, and college campuses has been muted.
If there were going to be another Intifada, it would have happened already. If Hezbollah were going to get involved, they would have. No riots in Arab/Muslim capitals either. Lots of leaks that Arab leaders hope Israel finishes Hamas off. Iran playing the usual Iran games at a somewhat elevated level, but not enough to make any kind of difference. Arab governments are still strongly signaling they want rapprochement with Israel.
Which is all pretty remarkable for two reasons:
– It shows what everyone thinks of Hamas and what a massive fuckup their 10/7 attack was.
– It gives Israel more freedom to keep going after Hamas and to keep the pressure up to get their hostages back. The focus here is always on the US and Biden enabling Hamas, while ignoring the bigger picture. Again, look at what people in the region and elsewhere say and compare it to what they do – stated vs revealed preferences.
It appears to this little cracker that “end the war right now” street runs both ways with the difference being that the “Hamas could…” contingent isn’t bothered by being called “anti-Palestinian.” Potentially, a sad comment on the character of the anti-Palestinians, but as always, YMMV.
[…]
The problem for Democrats as it relates to this particular question is that people distressed by Biden’s actions/apparent policy are stranded at the intersection of Damned if You Do and Damned if You Don’t with no bus stop or taxi stand in sight. Staying home can’t seriously be considered an option because the best way to assure a Trump victory is for Democrats to stay home–or vote third party. Republicans may not have the numbers to guarantee Trump a win, but Democrats certainly have the ability to guarantee that Biden loses. A conundrum at best.
Glad my vote doesn’t matter–living in a state where my vote for the Republican doesn’t count at the statewide level and a vote for a Democrat doesn’t count in the R+ 10 or 15 county.
ETA: “(And let’s assume the IDF has gotten a refresher course on not shooting people waving white flags…)”
Good point! Hope they got one.
@Gustopher:
Yes, I’m aware we’re always going to have selfish men who wrongly think their anger is a blank check license to act out. That doesn’t mean I should endorse their entitled antics. A parade of aggrieved angry male serial killers and mass shooters have made themselves heard with their vile actions, some leaving manifestos detailing their grievances. We don’t celebrate or justify this.
Someone who orphaned his children with self-immolation after ranting on Reddit about why the victims of 7 Oct deserved their fate because something something colonial apartheid state should not be celebrated as a martyr. He should be derided as a selfish ass who was radicalized online by wingnut falderal.
It’s doesn’t make sense to complain about tone policing while telling the exasperated majority to coddle the fwagile feewings of the stupids on the political fringes. Is tone policing bad or not? Everyone except the deplorables must censor themselves and play nice? Absolutely not.
Barbarians are at the gate. Enough with the coddling, consultant-manged politician-speak that inspires no one. It’s time for realtalk.
@Gustopher:
There will NEVER be anyone pure enough for that portion of the left flank. Ever. Those are the Nadar morons that got us George W. Bush. Those are the Jill Stein imbeciles that got us Trump.
Yeah. Idiots.
@EddieInCA: I’m more willing to cast blame for the 48% of Americans who actively vote for Trump and Republicans than the trivial numbers who vote third party, but you do you. The late deciders who pick Trump… there’s something worse going on there.
And if that trivial number of lefty third party voters is greater this year? Still, I’ll blame the folks who didn’t give them anything to vote for. And the folks who drove them away.
If Biden wants to have a pro-Israel policy, he has to make up for the voters he loses because of that elsewhere. Same with a pro-Palestinian policy, really, but that’s not on offer.
This reminds me of the call to throw queer folks under the bus to appeal to moderates that always happens around election season. Don’t be angry if don’t get the votes from under the bus.
For the progressive left, a well-timed announcement of civil rights violation charges for some dead trans kid’s murderers might help soften the pro-Israeli stance. For the Muslim Democrats? I don’t know.
Presidenting is hard. Politicking is hard. I’m not responsible for making the numbers add up, I’m just telling you that the people to blame aren’t the people who don’t feel like they have a place in the coalition, but in the people who don’t make them feel like they have a place.
I’ve think I’ve decided that I am not voting for Biden in November. I live in Washington, so my vote doesn’t matter*, but to the tiny extent that it might matter, I want Biden to get an electoral college win, but a popular vote loss.
Less about Gaza or anything, than a desire to create the situation where the electoral college is attacked on all sides as antidemocratic.
*: if Washington is close, Biden has lost. If I lived in Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Pennsylvania or Arizona, I’d have a different set of calculations. I’m missing a swing state, aren’t I?
@EddieInCA:
Please identify these “large number” of Democrats who refuse to condemn Hamas. Saying that you can understand why Hamas did what it did is not not condemning Hamas. Saying that you think the Palestinians deserve something better than what they have now is not not condemning Hamas.
Also please identify these large number of antisemitic Democrats. Being against Israel’s current actions, or past actions, is not being antisemitic.
@Kevin:
C’mon, Kevin. If you can’t acknowledge that the left has a antisemitism problem on the far left, you’re either being disingenuous or live in a bubble of your own choosing.
Democrats have an antisemitism problem on the far left
GOP antisemitism resolution passes House, fractures Democrats
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/rep-rashida-tlaib-faces-criticism-democrats-palestinian-remarks-rcna123735
There are alot more, from all different sites, chronicling the anti-semitism of many on the left. This isn’t new.
@Gustopher:
North Carolina, and maybe Nevada.
@Kevin:
If you want actual names, how’s this?
@EddieInCA: 10-15 out of a 435 member body, or a 213 member conference, is not “many.” It maybe qualifies as “some.” I’d personally call it “a few.” And those few weren’t not condemning Hamas, they were refusing to condemn Hamas while, at the same time, saying that the attack was “unprovoked” and also that Israel was right to “fully enforc[e] tight controls on what materials go into the Gaza Strip”. I’d have problems voting in support of those statements as well. There’s a difference between saying that something is right and saying that something is understandable. The attack was horrific. It shouldn’t have happened. But it wasn’t unprovoked. And it only succeeded because the IDF had been pulled away from Gaza to protect settlers in the West Bank.
And I didn’t say there wasn’t any antisemitism on the left. I’m disagreeing with you saying that it’s many on the left, or far left. Again, disagreeing with the actions of Israel now or in the past, or saying that Israel is an apartheid state, or that Israel is completely ignoring the stated position of the United States of a two-state solution, or that Israel is intentionally doing things to prevent a two state solution, none of those things are antisemitic. I’d argue that even saying that Israel has no right to exist isn’t antisemitic. (I disagree with that statement, but it isn’t, in itself, antisemitic.). Judaism and Israel are two separate things. It’s convenient for Israel to conflate the two things, but they aren’t the same thing.
Reading those articles, it’s mostly people saying that people are saying that the left has an antisemitism problem, just as Biden’s in trouble because there are all these articles about how Biden is in trouble. There’s little actual evidence that it’s a major, or even minor, problem. Is there less absolute support on the left for Israel than there has been in the past? Yes. But that’s not antisemitism. Liberals tend to be very aware of power dynamics, and Israel is no longer seen as something that needs protecting from its neighbors, it’s seen as a bully. But, again, that belief is not antisemitic.
@DK:
Here’s an idea for you — build a majority coalition that doesn’t depend on the stupids on the political fringes.
And then you can tell them that they are stupid and their values don’t matter with complete impunity. Or you can just ignore them as the irrelevant people they become in that scenario. You won’t have to coddle them or court their votes.
Alternately, court the votes of the lunatic caucus on the right. Tell them that Biden has been tried and executed for globalist pedophile crimes, and replaced with a clone that is doing Q’s bidding while Trump was infected with an erratic mRNA mind virus.
@Gustopher: all the percipacity of the European Left of the 1930s, betting on the fascist causing a clarity to their benefit. Fantasy land.
On other matters while I have long rolled my eyes when the Lefty here complained about media and Democrats in disarray narrative, I have to say the Michigan results coverage is in fact rather a real example there.
@EddieInCA: I respect you and your positions, but I have to say that when you post a portion of an article smearing Democrats and the only quote is from noted MAGA gasbag Byron Donalds it doesn’t do a lot to support your case.
@Gustopher:
It’s not a violation of a uniform code so much as a violation of laws and regulations prohibiting military personnel from engaging in partisan speech as military personnel. Obviously, someone who sets themselves on fire is immune from punishment. But the point of the statement is to distance the Air Force from the politics of the matter.
Since “Hamas surrenders” =/= “Hamas has been destroyed” I wonder if it would be quite as easy to stop as some people state.
@Assad K: I suspect you’re correct. Hamas isn’t a country, it’s a terrorist organization and an idea. Destroying Hamas is as doable as the War on Terror was in the 2000s. I mean, if Hamas says “we’re dissolving Hamas, we’re now the IRG,” did you meet your objective? If you kill everyone who is currently in Hamas, but leave people alive who will recreate Hamas, did you meet your objective? If you “destroy” Hamas, whatever that means, but are left with 1.5 million people who went from very little to loose to absolutely nothing to loose, because you burned what little they had down, did you meet your objective?
@EddieInCA:
Some people are only willing to compromise their principles so far.
You and I are mostly in agreement in Israel/Palestine, but even though I think they are wrong on the facts and other things, I can certainly understand how and why people on the other side of the issue would think Biden is complicit in genocide and killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians.
To those people, the argument that they must affirmatively vote for Biden because Trump would be more genocidal is a morally bankrupt choice.
It’s actually a good thing, IMO, that people have principles they won’t compromise on – it would actually be better, IMO, if more Americans actually voted for the candidate they actually think is best rather than settle for the one they hate less to avoid the one the hate more.