The Face Of US Foreign Policy Has Just Irrevocably Changed

I just wrote about how Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu can’t survive as Israeli Prime Minister. And I don’t mean in the long term, in my humble opinion we can measure the rest of Netanyahu’s current tenure as Prime Minister in months.

There are two reasons for this. First, as I pointed out in my previous article, the Israeli people have learned through years of experience that mass peaceful protests work! And when they don’t, then the Israelis can just mimic their French cousins and call for national strikes. And the second reason is that the Israeli constitution provides a procedure by which the Knesset can call for snap elections long before the next national election is due. And today, with Biden having held the armament Sword of Damocles over Netanyahu’s head, they can’t afford to let him stay.

But with that phone call today, the face of American foreign policy has just changed too, and I believe forever, and way to f*cking long overdue. Since their announcement as a free and sovereign state, the United States has been Israel’s staunchest and most generous supporter. Especially where military aid is concerned, since the fledgling Israeli state found itself surrounded by fundamental enemies. And despite occasional arguments and debates, funding for Israel has never been in serious question. And so it was a fundamental sea change in US-Israeli foreign relations today when President Biden came right out and and tied future US miliary iad to Israel to major structural changes to the way Israel is handling its war and humanitarian crisis with Hamas and the Palestinians. And in realpolitik, you don’t make a threat like that, and especially publicize it, if you’re not ready to carry through.

So what could have happened that caused such a cataclysmic change to the way we’re going to conduct our foreign policy with Israel? Actually it was a perfect storm. Bibi Netanyahu has been pissing off Americans, and especially Democrats all the way back to the Obama administration, when Netanyahu asked Obama for a state visit and speech to a joint session of congress. Obama knew that Netanyahu wanted to slam the pending Iran Nuclear Deal, and declined. Bibi went behind Obama’s back and got then GOP House Speaker Boehner to invite him instead. As Vice President at the time, Biden hasn’t forgotten the insult.

But as with so many things, timing is everything. The slaughter was on October 7, 2023. Israel quickly responded out of national rage and vengeance. We know that sentiment only too well. After 9/;11 Bush responded with national rage and vengeance, and two years later lied his way into a war with Iraq. Which only bought us a senseless 20 year slaughter on all sides. To our credit, the Biden admin istration sincerely tried to counsel the Israeli government of the risks of their overreach, and counseled caution.

Nihilist Netanyahu wasn’t interested in restraint. He went across the border into Faza like the Mongol Horde, and the civilian casualties be damned. And while Biden mumbled political platitudes like The Israeli right to self defense, the Palestinian civilian body count quickly topped 20,000 and then 30,000. What sympathy Israel had globally for the October 7th massacre quickly dissipated, taking the supportive US down with it.

And all of this spilling over into an election year. And while the Palestinians may not be a major voting bloc, they’re Muslim, and the Muslim voting bloc is a major player in Democratic politics, especially in critical swing states like Michigan. And as the body count piled up like a pinball score, US Muslim representatives like Rashida Tlaib, and Ilhan Omar made their displeasure clear, and started Muslim grassroots organizations to ramp up to keep the pressure on. Biden has a problem on his Muslim flank, in critical swing states.

In a typical far right Netanyahu d*ck move, the powerful AIPAC, the American Israeli Political action Committee sprang into action, announcing a multi million ad campaign to take out the representatives. In the old days, that would have been the kiss of death. But instead, Democratic aligned power interests immediately set up grassroots organizations and Super PAC’s to defend them. They put out their first ad condemning AIPAC for getting involved in domestic US politics.

This is a political landmine field for Biden. His own base is revolting against his blind support for what has turned out to be a murderous regime, and big money donors are standing up to be counted by supporting the anti Israel efforts. And worse yet, Biden’s blind support for Israel is drawing condemnation from foreign countries like England, France, and Germany, who don’t have the military aid entanglements to Israel that the United States does. And so, under extreme pressure, especially spousal pressure, Biden finally pulled the trigger.

And that genie can never be put back into the bottle. Historically the US has let Israel get away with sh*t that no other foreign country that the US supports, simply to avoid pissing off the powerful US Jewish voting bloc . But when the most powerful and influential US elected politician, NY Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer takes to the well of the Senate to denounce Netanyahu, and call for new elections in Israel, Israel has lost that magic moment. We give them weapons, and they listen to us. The salad days in Tel Aviv are over.

But here’s what makes this so important. Israel isn’t the only foreign government that we lavish military aid goodies on that treat us like sh*t in return. If I’m that fat slob in Riyadh, MBS, which I always mentally conflate to mean My Balls Stink, I’m not a very happy camper right about now. After all, I’ve been gleefully using US arms to conduct a shafow procy war against Iran in Yemen, without a peep. But if the US will start reining in their closest, longest term ally in the region, Israel, to get their sh*t together, why not start demanding human rights and gender reform, along with a cessation of the slaughter in Yemen to receive future aid?

The political face of United States foreign military aid has changed forever. Since WWII as a nation we have blindly submitted to the experience of the politicians to conduct foreign military policy. That changed, permanently with the Vietnam war. It was so bad that LBJ realized that it would be almost impossible to win a 2nd term, and even if he did, it wouldn’t be worth having. And so he bailed.

President George H W Bush did it right. He led a global coalition in response to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, which had widespread US and global support by limiting his greed. He settled for simply pushing Iraq back within their own borders, and containing them there.

Since then, every foreign entanglement has met with widespread popular US resistance. The invasion of Afghanistan following 9/11 was popular, but it quickly soured when people realized that we had no actual plan for victory, and even worse, we had no exit strategy if and when victory was achieved. And Bush’s popularity tanked after the start of the Iraq war, And both Obama and Trump ran into popular resistance for their long distance entanglements in Syria’s Russian backed civil war.

The world has changed, and for the better, especially in the United States. People in this country are sick and tired of the Big Swinging Dick strategy of military diplomacy. And because Traitor Tot has singlehandedly rejuvenated the idea of electoral activism to make our voices heard, politicians are now officially on notice. And not just wars that we start and prosecute, but wars that other countries are gleefully carrying out using US armaments. It’s not just the foreign US military aid recipients that are on notice, it’s the elective US officials who provide those arms. It’s a brave new world.

I thank you for the privilege of your time.