In case you had forgotten, and as we’ll see many in DC kind of did Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu will address a joint session of Congress this afternoon. It’s not the first time a foreign Head of State has done so. It’s not even the first time Netanyahu has done so. However, just as in 2016 he’s making a naked attempt to trash a Democratic nominee for President so that he can help get Donald Trump elected. Everyone knows why. Trump would let him do whatever the hell he wants. Bibi was massively unpopular at home before Hamas unleashed that awful terrorist attack and he’s not all that popular now. So he NEEDS to be able to crow to his people he’s whipped the current President and Congress into line and that they are backing him 100%. Or will be once he helps get Trump re-elected. However, despite what a month ago was shaping up to be a “bigly” moment, this is turning out to be little more than a blip on the radar!
Yes, Bibi is in town this week and almost no one has made note of it. Mentions in the news have been in passing. If you check out this article from Politico this could turn into a flop. For me the first word of the title – “Netanya-Who?” caused me to instantly check it out. Sure enough, at the rest of the article’s title indicate for most Bibi’s Bigly Adventure is being met overall with indifference, if not a downright cold-shoulder by many. Politico notes that ordinarily an address like this would take up most of the political oxygen in the weeks leading up to such a speech. For this? Well, not really:
But it appears Netanyahu has had very little to do in Washington during his visit so far. Some aides on both sides of the aisle needed to be reminded that the leader was even in town.
“I had someone ask me what I thought Netanyahu would say in his speech and I had to stop and think for a minute to realize that was this week. I had completely forgotten it was happening,” said a senior House aide.
Ouch. Netanyahu isn’t being treated like the conquering “hero” he thinks he is and sure as hell shamelessly promotes himself to be. Seeing “official DC” (elected officials, journalists and power brokers) basically yawning over him being in DC has got to be a serious blow for him. Not only has he not been if not the center of attention at least being one of the top stories in the news, hardly anyone cares (if they knew) he was here! Again, OUCH!
I found the article fun as hell to read. I’ve never made any secret of my disdain and sometimes hatred of Netanyahu. He has spent decades working furiously to prevent resolution of the issue of the problem of Jewish people and Palestinians sharing land where ancestors of both go back thousands of years. No, I don’t think Bibi is Hitler. He’s not and never has tried to literally start exterminating Palestinians like Hitler tried to do with Jews. However it’s clear he wants every last one of them driven from Israeli soil. And if lots of innocent Palestinians who don’t care about politics, and don’t even want Hamas (in Gaza) or the Palestinian Authority (the West Bank) running things because they are all corrupt jerks (or worse) wind up dying he doesn’t care. Like the leaders on both sides of “The Troubles” in northern Ireland Netanyahu, like Arafat has been an “important somebody” because of the conflict. No conflict, no more being important.
Without full, unqualified backing of the United States from the President on down through Congress on a full-throated and bi-partisan basis Netanyahu is vulnerable at home. So, he’s attempting to do what he did in 2016. Try to show Israelis he’s got the U.S. government in his pocket because he can literally influence a Presidential election. He likely did have some influence in 2016, but that was a long time ago. The U.S. is appalled at what Hamas did and is doing, but most Americans know the failures that allowed the attack to happen in the first place. It just occurred to me that most Americans, Trump supporters or not so quickly and readily saw obvious flaws that made the former President vulnerable at his podium in Butler.
However as the linked article (and Politico is sure as hell not some “liberal rag” – they actually lean a bit conservative) shows even before the Butler mess the attempts to hype up Netanyahu’s address to Congress were falling flat. Worse, it looks like there will be plenty of empty seats in the House chamber. Bibi was counting on a rousing, packed chamber address along the lines of what we saw when Ukrainian President Zelenskyy addressed Congress. That’s simply not going to happen. Bibi was hoping to set off a giant “Look at how much America loves me” bomb for the folks back in Israel.
It’s looking more like a partially wet firecracker that goes “pfffft.”
The protocols will be followed of course but there’s just no way in hell, not with everything else going on in this country that’s dominating the news (and in other countries too) that Netanyahu’s address to Congress is going to be a “must see” “feature event.” The whole thing, and that it happened might well vanish like a fart in a whirlwind. Hell, Israelis might look at how it plays in the U.S. and ole Bibi might wind up even more vulnerable – even with his Likud Party. THEY might decide to try and salvage their hold on power by tossing him aside.
In the end the plain fact is that the Head of State of a major ally is going to address a joint session of Congress and there’s a startling lack of interest in what would normally be a proverbial “Command Performance” event. If, as seems likely, the thing is the flop it’s shaping up to be Netanyahu’s meeting with President Biden which got shifted to Thursday should be interesting. He pushed his GOP friends with this for a long while before the formal invitation to speak was intended. Even in recent weeks he had to be “feelin good” and anticipating being able to dictate policy terms to President Biden. He was mistaken all along I think.
What matters is that Bibi thought he was going to walk in to the Oval Office “strapped” like Rambo ready to fight and against a “tied to a chair” and defenseless U.S. President. I suspect he’ll be walking in there huffing and puffing and when challenged all he’ll have are cap guns like we had when I was a very young boy. I’m of mixed feelings about watching the speech. I imagine there will be lots of bluster and GOPers might even cheer some of it “bigly” but it’s not going to play well on TV. It has a good chance of ultimately doing ole Bibi a lot more harm than good.
I love that Netanyahu’s vanity tour to Congress and Mar-a-Lardo is no longer newsworthy except for whatever anti-Bibi protests break out! Biden’s address tonight will overshadow both Bibi and and Bonzo…as well it should!!
I have to disagree. Netanyahu absolutely is trying to exterminate Palestinians in Gaza. Starving them, destroying all infrastructure, bombing hospitals and denying medical aid, chasing them from pillar to post and them bombing them in the supposed safe zones. and he knows damn well they can’t get out and away because HE CONTROLS THE BORDER CROSSINGS. and no other country will take them. If it wouldn’t irradiate his own land I fully believe he would take Republican advice and nuke them.
we have to stop enabling him.
Agree Nancy. The majority of those killed are women and children, exactly the people needed to continue the heritage of any peoples. how are we to ever know the Hammas leadership death toll that caused all that “collateral damage”to be required? That humans murdered while trying merely to exist are expendable because forces beyond their control anywhere on this planet deem it so from the safety of their self righteous fortresses.Power over pawns…everywhere,everyday.Sigh*
Don’t get me wrong, not caring about civilian casualties is damned close to wanting them if not pretty much the same thing. Maybe he does want to kill most or all of the people in Gaza. He has had the means to kill a million of them already, having herded them into relatively small enclaves. He knows he can’t get away with that. I won’t argue with those who say he’s trying to starve people to death because yes, he’s got that control at the border, and the floating pier hasn’t worked out like it should because Israel is searching each truck that comes off it.
Up in The Hague they’ve seen enough to say he’s committing war crimes and I won’t argue with them. Was there an Israeli version of the Wanasee conference in Germany where cold-blooded details of the extermination of Jews were worked out? I don’t know and neither do you. Is it fair to say at the very least some informal discussions along the lines of starve them out or even to death and use counter-terrosism as an excuse to kill tens of thousands in bombings to speed the process along? It think that’s highly possible if not probable.
It’s just inhumane. Plain and simple. Netanyahu isn’t a leader fighting a war for survival even though his country faces enemies that want to do what the Nazi’s couldn’t. He’s a war criminal himself. And whatever veneer of moral justification for defending itself Israel had has been scraped off by him in order to save his own desepicable ass.
Shame on Speaker Johnson for inviting him to speak, and shame on Leader Schumer for endorsing it. AND good for VP Harris who normally would be sitting up there behind him for skipping this travesty. I LOVE that she’s meeting with sorority sisters this afternoon. (For those who don’t know she went to DC’s Howard University)
Please remember these people have been sheltering a terrorist group who have said, continue to say, and always will say they will not stop attacking Jews until all of us (not JUST Israelis btw) are dead.
We are all responsible for our way in the world and that includes the Arabs living in Gaza. I get more than a little tired of hearing how the poor Gazans are being punished for what hamas is doing when the Gazans are allowing the terrorists to live among them. They could have fought against hamas if they wanted to truly rid themselves of the terrorists. They didn’t so Israel had to do what the Gazans won’t. Fighting to be free of whatever injustices there are in your community or nation is hard–this is a fact of life.
I do not like Netanyahu and I want him out of office and in prison where he belongs. That does not rid us of the pesky little FACT that there are millions of people surrounding a very small country who want nothing more than to, and these are THEIR WORDS, exterminate all Jews.
I’ll be damned if I will allow fucking terrorists or fucking americans to put Jews in danger. I don’t need to donate to the fuck-wad party, formerly democratic party, any further so I’ve PLENTY to give to my people in Israel.
I like being a pain in the ass. It brings me a great deal of pleasure particularly when I can spread it around rather than just applying it to magats. LMAO!
Sorry, Nancy, for my flippancy. I agree with your statement. I meant only that Netanyahu’s (and Trump’s) attempts to pat themselves on the back or seem like statesmen is what deserves to be overshadowed. This is vanity and is not news. The protests and the tragedies in Gaza and Israel are definitely newsworthy.
He’s greatly overplayed his hand in the war and by attaching himself to the hard right of American politics he risks going down with them. Some Israelis remember booting him out of power many years ago after he cashed in with developers who were exploiting a West Bank land grab. No doubt he’ll use this war as cover to try it again. His days are coming to an end.
Bibi calling those in support of Palestine “idiots” and “useful idiots” does little to sway those of us who have grown damned sick and tired of the killing of innocents: men, women and children. Bibi flips the proverbial bird in the face of his generous American benefactors. Bibi is a blood thirsty butcher. Say “Hello” to Israel’s slaughter house led by Netanyahu the Kapo. But, fear not, the U.S. will continue to GIVE billions to Israel. So, which “G/god” are we bowing before now?