On a Rainy Day

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20. Americans were divided on that conflict

...and supposing any American president was going to significantly restrain Israel after the attacks on them is just a cheap shot at the administration, imo.

We can talk about restraining Netenyahu, but it's just nonsense thinking that was gong to happen after the massacres of Israelis.

NPR:

...there was the acknowledgment of the political reality within the Israeli government. The U.S. saw Netanyahu as boxed in by far-right ministers in his Cabinet, and much of the Israeli public.

"We were up against a brick wall," remembered Satterfield, the Biden administration's special envoy for Middle East humanitarian efforts at that time. "The prime minister in one remark I remember said, 'If I were to allow even four trucks in, there would be IDF tanks in Jerusalem pointed at my office. The Israeli people would react.' That, of course, was hyperbole, but I'm giving you a sense of how difficult the conversation — and the public sentiment in Israel — was. Not one drop of aid, no fuel, no water; we can't do this. That was the message."

Shortly after the war began in October of 2023, it took a week of nearly nonstop negotiation to get Israel to open one water pipe into Gaza and almost another week to allow Rafah — Gaza's southern crossing with Egypt — to start operating again. By then, the humanitarian situation was deteriorating quickly.

https://www.npr.org/2025/08/28/nx-s1-5515620/israel-gaza-biden-famine

...this is like the way people complain about Democrats opposing republicans, without any workable lever to actually restrain them on each and everything they do wrong, criticizing them for not doing enough because more needed to be done, much of it out of their direct control.

The Biden administration isn't responsible for the attack on Israel or their military response in Gaza. Failing to stop Israel from retaliating the way they did wouldn't just be something restricted to the Biden presidency. That's not the history.

Fwiw, it's undeniable that the U.S. was ineffective in influencing Israel away from their deadly assaults and denial of humanitarian assistance to the innocent people they were bombing. But all of the criticism is speculation, mostly that Biden could have publicly jawboned Israel into relenting, which isn't evident in anything other than the projections.

A spokesperson for Blinken said he worked "relentlessly" on humanitarian aid for Gaza.

"He pressed Israel — publicly and privately — to take steps to minimize civilian harm and to uphold its obligations under international humanitarian law. He also sought out, encouraged and listened to different views within the State Department. Any suggestion to the contrary misrepresents both his leadership and the administration's sustained efforts to address the humanitarian crisis," the spokesperson said in a statement to NPR.

I think what many of his critics wanted was to treat Israel as an enemy instead of a wayward ally. Whatever the wisdom or efficacy of that, it remains to be seen if ANY presidential aspirant adopts that stance.

I'd guess any U.S. president is going to attempt to straddle the fence and try to keep Israel as a U.S. ally in the region, so there's always going to be the same muddled responses to Israel which so infuriate those looking to crush the Netenyahu regime.

I talk about this as if from a distance, because I am at a distance. I live here, in the U.S., where most of us have different expectations of our own government; those of which, concerns for managing the conflict between Israel and Gaza do not even begin to address.

It was a divisive diversion in the last election which speciously blamed the American president for the Israeli leader's abuses.

Despite as critical as it is to win a Democratic majority in the next one, people are lining up to do the same dividing thing, suggesting lopping off BOTH Democratic leaders before we vote as if that would be some incentive for voters to support Democrats in the next election.

It's the same backward nonsense that put Trump in the WH. That concerns me more than the obstinacy of the Israeli leaders to past and present demands made by people in the U.S. just as concerned with the violence as anyone else, which can be expected with the permission structure of Trump and republicans refusing to vote to restrain him.

You can't undo the last administration and election (which too many 'Democrats' waged against Biden and Harris) in the midterms. It was already done in by critics who couldn't tell (or admit) the difference between Trump and Biden/Harris.

Fact is, NO Democratic administration would act as Trump has in his acquiescing to Israel. That's the point of the next election, as well.