Inside storyFocus on leaders' personal dynamic is 'simplistic'

Biden’s foul-mouthed opinion of Netanyahu a bad $#%! sign, but Israel support endures

US officials acknowledge president losing patience with Israeli leader but stress ties ‘go beyond any one prime minister,’ say public airing of differences won’t be effective

Jacob Magid

Jacob Magid is The Times of Israel's US bureau chief

US President Joe Biden sits in the Oval Office of the White House, February 9, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik, File)
US President Joe Biden sits in the Oval Office of the White House, February 9, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik, File)

Much has been made of US President Joe Biden’s apparent distancing from Israel, as the war in Gaza progresses through its fifth month with no immediate end in sight.

The break has been framed as one with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in particular, with several officials leaking to American news outlets over the past week that Biden has privately called the Israeli premier an “a**hole” and a “bad f**king guy.”

Along with the expletives have been more concrete steps the US president has taken that seemingly depart from the bear-hug approach he used at the beginning of the conflict and during the 11-day Gaza conflict in 2021, when he overwhelmed Israelis with his public embrace, while privately seeking to nudge Jerusalem toward Washington’s preferred warpath.

Last week, Biden issued a memo setting new conditions for US military aid, which the White House acknowledged was crafted in consultation with congressional lawmakers who have called for restricting assistance to Israel.

Eight days earlier, Biden signed an executive order introducing first-of-their-kind sanctions against perpetrators of settler violence, which could shut off the entire settlement movement from the US financial system in addition to exposing government officials to financial penalties.

The president has indeed lost patience with Netanyahu, believing for months now that the premier is prepared to drag the war out due to narrow political considerations, two senior US officials told The Times of Israel this week. They added that this anger has been compounded by the premier’s thwarting of postwar US planning for the rehabilitation of Gaza and the solidification of an Arab-Israeli coalition to combat Iran, even as the prime minister refuses to present a viable alternative of his own.

People ride in a cart pulled by a tractor past the rubble of a destroyed building and a mosque minaret in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on February 14, 2024 (MOHAMMED ABED / AFP)

However, they also acknowledged that a more strategic shift in the administration’s ties with Israel is not currently on the horizon, be it in the form of withholding major security assistance to Israel or withholding its veto at the UN Security Council to allow a resolution against Israel to pass.

“The president understands that the relationship goes beyond any one prime minister and that allowing the relationship to fall apart would not be in the US national security interest,” one of the senior US officials said.

The second US official noted that Biden entered office urging his aides to avoid the types of public spats that characterized US-Israel ties during the Obama administration. They added that the president “continues to believe” that excessively litigating disagreements out in the open will not be effective with Netanyahu.

Israeli Ambassador to the US Michael Herzog echoed some of the sentiment expressed by the two US officials who sought to downplay the notion of a breakdown in ties.

“I suggest we don’t [present the current situation] as a historic level of tensions or some sort of crisis. There is a daily diplomatic dialogue between us and the administration where the administration fundamentally supports Israel’s war goal of defeating Hamas,” Herzog told the Kan public broadcaster on Wednesday.

“At the same time, [Biden] maintains a critical dialogue with us that has quite a few questions about how we are conducting the war and the direction in which we are taking it,” the envoy continued. “I do not foresee an end of [US] aid. I don’t expect the US to try to force a ceasefire on us in Gaza. I want to warn against all these dark predictions.”

Some of those predictions were likely made last week when Biden referred to Israel’s response to Hamas’s October 7 onslaught as “over the top.”

Such harsh rhetoric was not particularly new, though. Already in November, Biden was describing Israel’s bombing campaign as “indiscriminate,” but this has not stopped his administration from continuing to fundamentally support Israel and oppose a ceasefire.

A further test for the administration appears to lie ahead, as Algeria seeks to advance another resolution in the UN Security Council calling for an immediate ceasefire. But both US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield and her deputy Robert Wood have indicated that Washington will oppose the measure, arguing that it will undercut ongoing efforts in Cairo to secure an agreement between Israel and Hamas for an extended truce and hostage release.

Identity politics

A third senior administration official briefing reporters on Sunday pushed back on what he views as attempts by many in the media to overly focus on the dynamic between the two leaders.

The official noted that Netanyahu’s overarching war aim of dismantling Hamas and the need to operate in the terror group’s last-remaining stronghold in the southern Gaza city of Rafah is shared by the entire war cabinet, the majority of the Israeli public as well as the Biden administration, even though the US is clear about the need to simultaneously protect Palestinian civilians.

“In terms of the personalities [involved]… I think it’s a pretty simplistic way to analyze the overall situation,” the senior administration official said.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seen during a discussion and a vote on the state budget at the Knesset in Jerusalem, February 7, 2024. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

But it is not just a framework that is exploited in the media. A growing number of progressive lawmakers have taken to characterizing the IDF military operation to eliminate Hamas as “Netanyahu’s war,” even though it is one supported by an overwhelming proportion of Israelis.

The choice appears rooted in an understanding that Netanyahu’s popularity in the US is at an all-time low, making it politically more beneficial for lawmakers to present their opposition as specific to the prime minister, rather than Israel, which has maintained better favorables during the war.

The strategy appeared to pay dividends when it was applied to the Russia-Ukraine war, which even the Biden administration has branded as “Putin’s war.”

But the first US official acknowledged that applying such framing to the Israel-Hamas war “is a little simplistic,” adding that it appears to be pushed by many “who think the US has this magic wand that we can wave to make the crisis go away, regardless of what Israel and Hamas say or do.”

The official pointed to daily press briefings at the White House and State Department where reporters lay into the administration for ostensibly not doing more to pressure Israel in one loaded question after another.

US President Joe Biden meets with victims’ relatives and first responders who were directly affected by the Hamas attacks, Wednesday, Oct. 18, 2023, in Tel Aviv. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

“We have leverage that we can wield, and you’ve seen us use sticks that we haven’t used before,” the senior US official said. “But we also have to be strategic and try and try and solve disagreements behind the scenes as much as possible.”

The official acknowledged that voices inside the administration calling for a more aggressive approach are growing, even if they haven’t been the “decisive” ones.

They are gaining traction as the presidential election approaches and as Biden seeks to maintain support among progressives infuriated by his support for Israel against Hamas.

Those more critical voices in the administration think the US could take advantage of the political capital Biden has accumulated with Israelis thanks to his intense support for the Jewish state at the beginning of the war by going over the head of Netanyahu and making a more direct appeal for his postwar plans to the Israeli public, the senior US official said.

“But it would probably take a more fundamental break in the relationship for such dramatic steps to occur,” the official added.

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