Jonathan S. Tobin
JNS, Sept. 4, 2025
“… above all, the goal for Washington is to end the fighting in Gaza and preclude the outbreak of full-scale war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, at almost any cost. The sooner the guns are silenced, the quicker they can put the whole issue behind them and preclude losing the far more numerous pro-Israel voters in the American political center in the election.”
After 11 months of second-guessing, sabotaging and undermining the Israeli effort to defeat Hamas, President Joe Biden doubled down on his administration’s policy that has been so beneficial to the terrorists. His declaration that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was not doing enough to secure a deal to release the remaining hostages taken by Hamas on Oct. 7 was very much in line with the entire tenor of Washington’s approach to the conflict. Coming in the wake of the announcement that six of the remaining hostages had been murdered, including one American, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, in cold blood by Hamas, the implication pointed to Netanyahu’s supposedly tough stance in the negotiations as the cause of their deaths and not the diabolical intentions of their Hamas captors.
This is entirely outrageous. Blaming Netanyahu for the murders of the hostages, whether implicitly or directly, is giving Hamas a pass for its latest act of barbarism. Hamas is a genocidal criminal organization that has rejected every ceasefire proposal since the initial pause last fall. The idea that Netanyahu is somehow responsible for their crimes because he hasn’t abandoned the effort to ensure that Oct. 7 cannot be repeated—as it most certainly would be if conditions like an Israeli withdrawal from crucial points in the Gaza Strip like the Philadelphi corridor along the border with Egypt—is sheer madness. … [To read the full article, click here]
