White House quietly supported invasion of Lebanon, despite opposition from Pentagon and State Department — Politico
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/20919616
Senior White House figures privately told Israel that the U.S. would support its decision to ramp up military pressure against Hezbollah — even as the Biden administration publicly urged the Israeli government in recent weeks to curtail its strikes, according to American and Israeli officials.
Not everyone in the administration was on board with Israel’s shift, despite support inside the White House, the officials said. The decision to focus on Hezbollah sparked division within the U.S. government, drawing opposition from people inside the Pentagon, State Department and intelligence community who believed Israel’s move against the Iran-backed militia could drag American forces into yet another Middle East conflict.
Officials in the intelligence community, in briefings and talks with members of Congress last week, had said they were increasingly worried about the potential for a direct ground confrontation between Israel and Hezbollah. Similar conversations were occurring in the State Department, where officials were concerned about the mounting civilian death toll in Lebanon.
The internal administration division seems to have dissipated somewhat in recent days, with top U.S. officials convening Monday at the White House with President Joe Biden to discuss the situation on the ground. Most agreed that the conflict, while fragile, could offer an opportunity to reduce Iran’s influence in Lebanon and the region.
Still, the White House is walking a fine line, U.S. and Israeli officials said. The Biden administration wants to support Israel’s actions against a U.S.-designated terrorist group that has killed Americans and threatens the region. But it is not comfortable endorsing Israel’s campaign completely — or publicly — because it is worried it will creep too far into Lebanese territory, instigating an all-out war, one of the U.S. officials said.
This won't end well for anyone. What the fuck man.
I like Joe Biden in every other respect, but what the hell is up with this hard-on for Israel? Is it purely AIPAC and the Jewish-American vote, or is there some other calculus going into all this? I expected better, but they're just rubber-stamping anything and everything that Israel wants to do, no matter how fucked up.
I think this is just the hill he's decided to die on. Zion uber alles or some ideological shit like that.
Well, he is pretty old. Hammered in guilt and fervour for Israel due to being born during and growing up shortly after WWII?
It wouldn't be the first time Israel engaged in compromat. Either that or he's completely blind to what's going on.
I have never supported Zionism and never will. However, I don't think most people truly understand how important Israel is to the US as a strategic ally. It's not some elaborate conspiracy, they're just a key aspect of US hegemony.
Can you elaborate on how and why Israel is such an important ally? It's got to be more than just a foothold in the region, surely?
In terms of weapons and cyber security israel is one of the top nations. Their weapons are 'battlefield tested' ( on innocent Palestinians), and their cybersecurity is pretty strong. In addition to that, they will always do what the US says, should the US abandon them they will immediately turn to another country to support them, now this country has top us technology.
Also they have nukes, so you must keep the country safe and stable. If Israel is invaded by the surrounding countries, suddenly Egypt has nukes, and will no longer need to rely so heavily on us support.
Illegal nukes, and technology developed with US money and in partnership with the US.
I guess your argument amounts to a sunk cost argument.
Not really, nukes and military tech don't just disappear. I'm not for Israel, but there's a reason it's not as clear cut as people pretend it is
That is the definition of the sunk cost fallacy.
Because they oppose Iran. Same reason why we provided weapons to Iraq.
Israel offers no strategic advantage to the U.S. The U.S. has extensive military presence in the region without their land. The U.S. does not have a significant or unique trade relationship with Israel (we mostly just trade diamonds). And Israel offers no special capability to the U.S. regarding technology or foreign intelligence.
Our relationship with Israel is based on two things: mythology and political donations. That's it. That's all it has ever been. Conservatives (including neo-libs) who receive money from Israel occasionally make up fake reasons, but those reasons always disintegrate under the lightest scrutiny.
It's time to end our extremely one-sided relationship with Israel. This is a deadly, toxic relationship that destabilizes our more profitable relationships with Israel's neighbors in the middle east.
Dude's a Christian Zionist.
I actually doubt that. Zionism is usually an Evangelical Protestant trait, this notion that we need to force prophecy to be true isn’t associated with Catholicism.
I realize that from the outside all flavors of any given religion look pretty similar, but there is a stark difference between your average Catholic and your average Evangelical. And between various flavors of Protestantism, some of which are far more similar to Catholicism than they are to the more “Evangelical” Southern Baptists, Pentecostals, or non-denominational megachurches.
Point is, I would be shocked to find that Zionism is a religious belief for J’Biden. It’s far more likely that his position regarding Israel is more rooted in realpolitik support for one’s allies at any cost, which is also reprehensible.
Israel is the closest thing to a modern democracy with progressive western style values in the entire region. Israel has a multitude of diverse cultures and ethnicities integrated into its society, and has a vastly better stance on equal rights for women, lgbt, and ethnic minorities, than any of its neighbors.
Probably also has something to do with all of the other countries in the area being client states of Russia/Iran/China.
Fun fact. It is illegal in most cases to marry outside your culture in Israel. Basically illegal to race mix, though more complicated than that. Also Israel does not recognize gay marriage. I don't care if Lebanon has worse rules. We don't call an apartheid state valid for being at 1900 Jim Crow standards .
Perhaps they should have left Western style Manifest Destiny in the past.
Calling Israel aligned with Western values is a pretty big self own
They said it's the closest in the region.
Which of its neighbors is more closely aligned with Western values?
No it's accurate: apartheid settler colonial state genociding the native population and bringing war to the middle east.
Not something to flex about though on either side.
You name your favorite country, and I'll tell you why they shouldn't flex either.
Oh ok nvm then carry on Israel
Everyone makes mistakes, all mistakes are fine!
Iran influence is based on "Israel" actions. No Genocide, No aggression, means no one would need Iran. The same in Iraq and other regions. Which makes me question the statement unless these people are really stupid.
Shades of "if we just keep indiscriminately bombing in the vicinity of where we think terrorists are, we'll certainly reduce the influence of terrorist organizations among the populace".
Surely it's worth a nearly infinite number of (Arab) lives and residential buildings to kill one Hezbollah leader. After all, they're super-terrorist masterminds without which no one could think of setting off a bomb or firing unguided rockets into Israel.
Not to mention that this is exactly how you create more terrorists (and Bibi knows this)
Out of curiosity, is there a way to find out how many Americans have been killed by Hezbollah and hamas vs Israel?
All of those numbers are teeny tiny in comparison to the number of Americans killed by America.
Are you denying Israel has the right to start World War III due to its half century of barbaric apartheid occupation and abuse of the Palestinian people?
Annihilating your neighbors because they refuse to bow down to your genocidal regime is self defense!
fuck genocde-joe and may he burn eternally in hell
They did not quietly support it, when you learn to look for their actions instead of their words.
That land is owed to Israel, it’s not an invasion and you’re an antisemite, or whatever Reddit said
Ok so I have a solution. We glass Israel, Lebanon and Iran. About 10m people per faction. We can use neutron bombs as well to make it super highly radioactive for quite a while.
That way NO ONE can live in that region and be dragged into more stupid wars and it equally distributes the deaths.
The stupidest part of this exceedingly stupid take is your assertion that the United States has any right to decide what to do halfway across the world.
Imperialism, paternalism, and down right stupidity rolled into one. An alternative solution is to "glass" you and everyone like you in countries all over the world so that we can move forward towards a solution.
Alright since you and a handful of other people didn't pick up that I wasn't actually serious about murdering 10m people imma respond.
This is an exceedingly complex issue that clearly can't be solved by any of us on the internet. It was a problem started by a lot of people who are long dead. By the time I was born the whole shit show had gotten to pretty much this exact same spot.
I don't know why the US has supported Israels actions for the past 80 years. I don't know why they continued in the past 30 among anything. I do know that there is a lot of economic interest and military benefits in keeping Israel right where it is.
One problem is Israel has Netanyahou and other than Israeli's we can't do shit about that. Hezbollah is a proxy by which Iran can war with Israel. Another Problem is Iran doesn't have the military strength to be a concern to most Western countries, but it can fuck with the whole region and fuck it's own people quite well and happily does.
If the US stopped giving weapons to Israel (which I assume Israel isn't actually paying for) then Israel would be forced to manufacture its own weapons internally or find some way to generate the money to buy the weapons (probably through taxes). Both of which will force Israel into a position where stupid military strikes become unpopular because of the cost to the citizens.
But from what I understand the US won't stop giving the weapons because of the strategic importance of Israel, and protecting quite a few big companies that set up shop there. Compound that with the strange notion that the religious right has about Israel being some sort of Land for Jews at all costs.
Once you bring religion into the picture the clusterfuck being a domestic nightmare, an international nightmare, and a humanitarian nightmare.
Based on what I know, the logical choice is that the US witholds weapons. But the US didn't. Logic keeps getting thrown out. It quickly becomes an emotional issue that no one can work together on as you and a whole bunch of other people have made a great example.
Fairness would be glassing - think along the lines of Thanos in Infinity War. It doesn't actually solve anything, it just resets the entire geographic area to no longer be an issue.
Justice would be completely different. There will be no justice, because all the factions disagree on what that would be.
You said way more this time but still ended it with killing 10 million people and permanently destroying their homeland is "fair".
Two women approach the king. One woman claims the other kidnapped her baby. The other claims the baby is hers. The king says fine, he'll cut the baby in half for both of them out of fairness.
The woman with the baby sees this as technically fair.
Horrified, the woman says the other woman can keep the baby to ensure it survives.
In the rest of the parable the king gives the horrified women the baby as that is the expected response of a mother.
I am offering a fair solution. I'm not offering a realistic or sustainable solution. I have yet to hear from any faction (other that the Israeli led genocide) a detailed solution to ensuring a good outcome. This falls on the US too. The US has the capability of the King - the West as a whole can enforce it until the region can enforce it themselves.
a great demonstration of your bronze age worldview
And I have yet to hear what you consider fair.
I already said that you and everyone like you getting out of the way would be fair
Oh you mean the glass the West thing.
I guess I didn't even think of that as being a solution to the Israel problem because it just removes countries with their shit together. And the only real country that could glass the West is probably China given that Russia threatening nuclear consequences so often has clearly painted them as not having any that function.
If China did that, it wouldn't really be fair to the Chinese due to the massive amounts of IP and funds they rely on external to their country. Not to mention all the other companies that depend on globalization.
I mean if you think shits bad now wait until it's just countries where there is absolutely no voting, no education, and it's run by cults. I don't think that's very fair. Plus, you're talking billions of lives of one side of an issue rather than 10 million equally distributed between sides.
Getting people out of the way is precisely the problem. Netanyahou wants his opposition out of the way. To do that he intends to distract by getting Palestinians out of the way. Iran has some connection to that I don't understand still so they fund Hezbollah to get the IDF out of the way, which then Israel wants to get Lebanon out of the way to get to Hezbollah out of the way. At which point it becomes Iran and Israel trying to get eachother out of the way. If total nuclear annihilation was your solution, that seems far more fair than just the West.
I'm not gonna read all that but no I don't mean "the West" I mean people like you whose opinions are not useful. It can be glassing, shutting up, or otherwise fucking off for all I care.
Adults are speaking
You're hardly speaking, you're just saying I'm evil for offering up a terrible yet balanced solution.
And if you're not going to read my arguments I can tell you don't actually have anything to gain or lose in this conversation, you're merely here to stroke fire.
Maybe that's what I'm doin? Maybe I'm trying to infuriate you? Or maybe I'm trying to get your mind to stop being so emotional about this and realize that feelings are going to get in the way the whole time. Deescalating any of this requires calm.
And my solution would certainly calm things down there. Maybe not from Iranian allies or Israel allies, but in the area they would be.
what is this Thanos-ass argument you're trying to legitimize by your persistence? No one takes it seriously and you're unwell for suggesting it. I'm glad you're nobody.