On Friday, Russia and China vetoed a UN Security Council Resolution sponsored by the United States that was intended to impose an immediate cease fire in the Gaza Strip, effectively forcing an end to Israel’s war against the Hamas terrorists before Hamas is defeated.
Because we are no longer its reliable ally, Israel is alone in the world.
Russia and China must have greatly enjoyed their vetoes because the irony of them is deep, dark, and disturbing. The resolution they vetoed proved redundantly that Biden and his minions have changed our policy toward Israel so that we are no longer its reliable ally. (READ MORE from Jed Babbin: Biden Does Nothing for Americans Held Abroad)
For over six decades the U.S. has been vetoing UNSEC resolutions in defense of Israel, usually sponsored by one or more Arab states and supported by Russia and China. UNSEC resolutions are supposed to have the force and effect of international law but they are routinely ignored by the dictators, despots, rogues, and terrorists that comprise much of the UN’s membership.
The UN General Assembly, in which the U.S. has no veto, has routinely castigated Israel for many imaginary flaws. The capstone was an UNGA resolution, passed in November 1975, that defined Zionism as racism. It wasn’t until 1991 that the “Zionism is racism” resolution was revoked.
Israel is the UN’s most-criticized country. Since 1975 we have vetoed more than four-dozen UNSEC resolutions bashing Israel. In 2014 alone the U.S. vetoed 21 such resolutions. (Only four UNSEC resolutions that year criticized other countries.)
Why did Russia and China veto the U.S. resolution? It’s puzzling because they want to see Israel defeated even more than Biden does. They probably got a laugh out of it and didn’t want to give Biden even that small a success.
In past years, when grownups were in charge, we had rules about how we would either vote for or veto UNSEC resolutions.
John Negroponte was Bush 43’s UN ambassador from 2001-2004. Negroponte came up with rules for considering anti-Israel resolutions in the Security Council. His five rules said that a resolution condemning Israel also had to include a robust condemnation of terrorism and incitement to it, explicit condemnation of terrorist organizations such as Hamas, and a call for dismantling of the infrastructure that supports terror operations.
Needless to say, last Friday’s resolution offered by the United States — read Biden and Blinken — followed none of the Negroponte rules.
Instead, the Biden-Blinken resolution: (1) called for an immediate and sustained cease-fire; (2) urged all parties to leave unhindered aid flowing to Gaza; (3) said that a further Israeli offensive into Rafah, in southern Gaza, would result in more harm to and displacement of civilians; and (4) rejected Israel’s plan to create a buffer zone between it and Gaza.
The resolution didn’t demand release of Hamas’s hostages, among whom are five Americans and the bodies of at least three who died in Hamas captivity. Israel has often said that it would agree to a cease-fire if the hostages are released. Hamas refuses to release them. (READ MORE: The Coming Ramadan War)
Israel wants a buffer zone between it and Gaza to help detect and prevent more attacks like October 7, but Biden and Blinken don’t want such a barrier to future attacks.
The Biden-Blinken resolution has many roots. The first is the Michigan Democratic primary vote in which one hundred thousand voters checked “uncommitted” instead of voting for Biden. That has panicked the Biden team.
The second is the fact that Biden has been insisting — going back to the October 7 attack that killed 1,200 Israelis and took more than 240 hostages — that Israel not invade the Gaza Strip at all. Israel delayed its response for weeks over Biden’s objections.
Third is the fact that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has refused to be pushed around by Biden. As I have written elsewhere, Netanyahu has insisted that Hamas cannot be destroyed unless Israel scours it from Rafah and southern Gaza. He has said that opposing Israel’s coming campaign in and around Rafah is tantamount to opposing Israel’s victory in the war Hamas started.
National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan called that statement “nonsense,” which is comprehensively wrong. His thinking — and Blinken’s and Biden’s — is why Israel can no longer regard us as a reliable ally. That thinking was reflected in Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s March 14 speech in which he called on Israeli voters to throw Netanyahu out of office.
Because we are no longer its reliable ally, Israel is alone in the world. No other nation will stand up for the only democracy in the Middle East.
Don’t forget the fact that Israel is highly dependent on the U.S. for military aid, especially the “Iron Dome” missile system that protects Israeli civilians and military from missiles launched from Gaza or Lebanon. Iranian-backed Hizballah almost regularly fires from Lebanon aimed at Israeli cities and towns. Even the Iranian-backed Houthis of Yemen launched a missile at Israel a few days ago.
Hamas could achieve the extended cease-fire that Biden and Blinken want simply by releasing the hostages it still holds. But they won’t.
So what can Israel do?
A few days ago, Blinken made yet another trip to Israel to pressure Netanyahu to not defeat the Hamas battalions in Gaza. But Netanyahu won’t bend. He told Blinken, “There is no way for us to defeat Hamas without going into Rafah and eliminating the rest of the battalions there.” He added, “I told him that I hope we will do it with the support of the USA, but if we have to, we will do it alone.”
And they might. About six weeks ago, Biden issued a memo threatening all U.S. allies with a cutoff of military aid unless they proved — within forty-five days — that they were compliant with all U.S. laws on humanitarian treatment of others. Israel, at last report, had not responded to Biden’s demand which was clearly aimed at them. (READ MORE: Biden Blackmails Israel)
Donald Trump was an avid supporter of Israel. But the November election — and his possible victory and January 2025 inauguration — is a long way off. Israel will have to go it alone until then. If Biden is reelected, Israel will be very much alone, isolated and friendless.