US-Israel strains driven by domestic political factors in Washington and Jerusalem - analysis

“The fight between our governments is unnecessary, it is meant for domestic politics,” opposition leader Yair Lapid said on Monday in a video speech to an AIPAC conference in Washington.

“We have people here, at the highest levels, who mistakenly think that it will help them with their political base,” he added.

Speaking from Israel, the “here” Lapid referred to was Jerusalem, meaning that there are people at the highest level of the Israeli government who are feeding off the current round of tension between Washington and Jerusalem for political gain. First and foremost: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

And he is right.

Tensions becoming political capital

Netanyahu is using the recent tiff with US President Joe Biden to score political points and to firm up his base of support. This gives him a message for the next election, whenever that may be, when almost all of the polls indicate he will confront an avalanche of anger over the October 7 debacle. His message: “Despite what happened on October 7, I can stand up to world pressure, even to pressure from our most cherished and important ally, the United States.”

But Netanyahu is not the only partner in this dance “using the fight between our governments” as Lapid put it, for political purposes. So is Biden.

There is no doubt that Biden’s tone on Israel has changed significantly since those first weeks after October 7, when he set a new standard of support by an American president for Israel and the Jewish people during a time of crisis. In the process, he earned the appreciation and affection of the vast majority of Israelis, many of whom were frankly surprised by the depth and sincerity of that support.

Back then he pledged to give Israel all the military support it needed to defeat Hamas, whose bloodthirstiness and brutality he compared with that of ISIS. On October 10 he said, “We will make sure Israel has what it needs to take care of its citizens, defend itself, and respond to this attack.”

Back then he doubted the casualty numbers coming out of Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry, saying on October 26 – when this number stood at some 7,000 Palestinians killed – that he had “no confidence” in those casualty figures.

Biden's change in tone

Five months later, as the terrifying images from Israel on October 7 were replaced by haunting images from Gaza, his tone has changed. It has changed so much so that on Tuesday, Politico quoted four anonymous US officials as saying that Biden will consider conditioning military aid to Israel if it goes forward with plans to move into Rafah.

This stands in stark contrast to his previous stance five months ago, when he said the US would make sure Israel has what it needs to respond to the Hamas massacre.

And whereas in the past he doubted casualty figures from Gaza, in his State of the Union address on Thursday night he referenced the 30,000 figure now being circulated by Hamas as if it were indisputable truth, making no distinction between Hamas terrorists killed – a number Israel estimates at 13,000 – and the rest.

Obviously, this change has to do with the length of the fighting and the suffering inside Gaza. Everyone realized that the support and empathy he showed for Israel on his visit here on October 18 would gradually diminish as the war dragged on and the suffering increased.

But that is not the only reason why the tone has changed. Biden is no less a political animal than Netanyahu, and his changing tone has to do with helping his political base, as Lapid said of Netanyahu.

Enter Biden's reelection campaign

Biden is in a pickle. To beat Donald Trump in November, he needs the youth and progressives not only to turn out and vote for him, but also to campaign for him; to bring the same energy to the upcoming campaign as they did in 2020.

But that enthusiasm and excitement are simply not there this time around. While this is not only because of the war in Gaza – even if there were no war waging, it is hard to think a Biden candidacy would fire up Democrats to the same degree as last time – the situation in Gaza is undoubtedly not helping matters.

So Biden is changing his tone. But he has to be careful, lest he alienate that not insignificant slice of the American public that remains strongly pro-Israel. It’s not going to help Biden come November if, as a result of shifting policy on Israel, he can win Michigan, with its large Muslim population, but loses Pennsylvania, Arizona, and Nevada – with significant Jewish and pro-Israel voters – in the process. He needs to keep progressive and pro-Israel supporters at the same time.

But how can that be done? One way is to try to separate Israel from its government; turn Netanyahu into the bogeyman, coming down heavy on him to appease the progressives, while at the same time – to keep from alienating the pro-Israel crowd – saying that he doesn’t represent the Israeli people.

Listen to US Vice President Kamala Harris during a CBS interview on Friday: “I think it’s important for us to distinguish, or at least to not conflate, the Israeli government with the Israeli people,” she said.

On Saturday night, Biden seemed to be reading from the same script and trying to drive a wedge between the Netanyahu government and the Israeli people, accusing him in an MSNBC interview of “hurting Israel more than helping Israel.”

But this strategy is founded on wishful thinking, with the Biden administration misinterpreting an Israeli dislike for the current Netanyahu government – something borne out in the polls – as a dislike for government policy vis-a-vis Hamas, the war, Rafah, and a Palestinian state, something not borne out by the polls.

Questions of whether Israel will operate in Rafah

The main bone of contention between Jerusalem and Washington now is over Rafah, with the US warning Israel against a ground incursion there to finish off the remaining Hamas battalions, because of the fear of a humanitarian catastrophe, and Netanyahu saying that Israel will have to go into Rafah, because only by going into Rafah can Israel effectively finish off Hamas as a military threat.

The idea that somehow this is a narrow position only held by Netanyahu and his government, and that the Israeli public is not there, is a misguided one. An Israel Democracy Institute poll on Sunday found that the majority of Israelis (64.5%), and even a greater majority of Israeli Jews (74%) believe that Israel needs to go into Rafah, including even 30% of those who identify themselves as on the Left.

Israelis may not like Netanyahu, but they do not necessarily oppose some of his policies, both his intent to go into Rafah and his opposition to a Palestinian state.

Netanyahu, in a Monday interview on Fox, responded to Biden’s recent comment about setting a redline for Israel in Rafah and having a “come to Jesus meeting,” by saying, not without merit, that “the overwhelming majority of Israelis supports my policies that we have to eradicate Hamas as a terrorist and governing organization, that we have to get our hostages back and have to make sure that Gaza does not form a threat to us anymore.”

Netanyahu also pointed out that the Knesset recently voted 90-9 backing his opposition to any unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state.

“So, when people say we have to talk with Netanyahu because he is holding back this wondrous prospect of peace with a Palestinian state, you don’t have an issue with me, you have an issue with the entire people of Israel,” he said. “They are united as never before in uniting to destroy Hamas and ensure that we don’t have a Palestinian terror state like the one we had in Gaza that could threaten the State of Israel."

Netanyahu here is correctly representing public opinion, though this should not be seen as support for Netanyahu himself nor a desire to see him continue as prime minister.

Or, to use Harris’s language, the US should not conflate the dislike much of the public feels toward Netanyahu with a rejection of his positions about the need to destroy Hamas, go into Rafah, and oppose a Palestinian state. These are policies that would likely be pursued right now were National Unity Party head Benny Gantz or even Lapid in power.