<div dir="ltr">
<h1>Is Biden administration seeking de-escalation – or driving Middle East war?</h1><p class="gmail-article__subhead"><em>As
Washington calls for a regional ceasefire, it continues to provide
political and military support for Israel. Is the expanding war failed
diplomacy — or what the US really wants?</em></p><div class="gmail-responsive-image"><img src="https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/story_48_final-1728355426.jpg?resize=770%2C513&quality=80" alt="Lighter with American flag with a flame over an Israeli rocket" width="435" height="290" style="margin-right: 25px;"></div>The
administration of US President Joe Biden has supplied Israel with
billions of dollars worth of bombs and weapons [Nataliia Shulga/Al
Jazeera]<div class="gmail-article-info-block"><div class="gmail-article-b-l"><div class="gmail-article-author-name"><span class="gmail-article-by">By </span><span class="gmail-article-author-name-item"><a class="gmail-author-link" href="https://www.aljazeera.com/author/ali_harb_200919153312036">Ali Harb</a></span></div><div class="gmail-article-dates"><div class="gmail-date-simple gmail-css-1yjq2zp"><span class="gmail-screen-reader-text">Published On 9 Oct 2024</span><span aria-hidden="true"> -<font size="1"> </font></span><font size="1"><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/9/is-biden-administration-seeking-deescalation-or-driving-middle-east-war">https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/9/is-biden-administration-seeking-deescalation-or-driving-middle-east-war</a></font></div></div></div><div class="gmail-social-share-buttons"><div class="gmail-update-reading-list"></div></div></div><div class="gmail-update-reading-list"><span class="gmail-update-reading-list__tooltip" role="tooltip"></span></div><a class="gmail-social-share-button" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" aria-label="Share on Facebook" href="https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Faje.io%2Fpl8spv"></a><a class="gmail-social-share-button" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" aria-label="Share on Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=Is%20Biden%20administration%20seeking%20de-escalation%20%E2%80%93%20or%20driving%20Middle%20East%20war%3F&source=sharethiscom&related=sharethis&via=AJEnglish&url=https%3A%2F%2Faje.io%2Fpl8spv"></a><a class="gmail-social-share-button gmail-copylink" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" aria-label="Copy link" href="https://aje.io/pl8spv"></a><p><strong>Washington, DC –</strong> Holding an <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/program/newsfeed/2024/2/27/biden-hopes-for-a-gaza-ceasefire-by-monday">ice cream</a>
cone, United States President Joe Biden declared in February that a
ceasefire in Gaza is so “close” that it may materialise within days.</p>
<p>More than <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/2/27/israels-war-on-gaza-live-biden-comments-turn-focus-back-to-gaza-ceasefire">seven months</a>
later, not only has Israel’s war on Gaza continued but it has expanded,
with Israeli troops invading and bombing Lebanon as tensions and
violence boil over across the Middle East.</p>
<p>The Biden administration has continued to verbally call for
de-escalation while also providing Israel with political support and a
steady supply of bombs to sustain its wars.</p>
<p>Washington has welcomed nearly every escalatory step Israel has taken this year: the killing of Hamas leaders in Beirut <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/7/31/hamass-political-chief-ismail-haniyeh-assassinated-in-iran-state-media">and Tehran</a>, the assassination of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah and the invasion of south Lebanon.</p>
<p>More <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/7/one-year-of-israels-war-on-gaza-a-simple-guide">than a year</a>
since the outbreak of war in Gaza, Israel is pushing on with its
devastating offensive in the besieged Palestinian territory, which has
killed nearly 42,000 people, while bombing Beirut daily and preparing
for an attack against Iran.</p>
<p>As the conflict in Gaza intensifies and spreads <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/7/israel-steps-up-lebanon-bombing-as-hezbollah-attacks-haifa">across the region</a>, the gap between US rhetoric and policy is widening.</p><p>So, is the Biden administration simply failing to rein in Israel – as
many liberal commentators have suggested? Or is it actually responsible
for the escalation, exploiting the chaos to advance a hawkish agenda
against Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah?</p>
<p><strong>The short answer:</strong> With its continuing military and
diplomatic support for Israel, the US remains a key driver of the
violence in the region despite its statements about restraint and calls
for a ceasefire, analysts say. While it is difficult to speculate about
the administration’s motives or true intentions, there is a growing body
of evidence showing that the Biden administration is in lockstep with
Israel, not merely a passive ally which is being defied.</p><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-7 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_8965" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"><div class="gmail-vjs-poster" aria-disabled="false"><span class="gmail-vjs-poster" tabindex="-1"><img alt="" src="https://cf-images.eu-west-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/665003303001/61116531-d825-4f1b-9b52-e604a214870f/08ccaa4c-11c3-460b-96e2-96b9bc2bd4d1/1920x1080/match/image.jpg" width="435" height="245" style="margin-right: 0px;"></span></div><div class="gmail-vjs-text-track-display"><div style="margin:1.5%"></div></div></span></div></div></div><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-7 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_8965" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"></span></div><div class="gmail-video-duration__brand-bar"><span class="gmail-screen-reader-text">Video Duration 59 minutes 05 seconds </span><span aria-hidden="true" class="gmail-video-duration__duration">59:05</span></div><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><ul class="gmail-playlist-horizontal-container gmail-in-article-brightcove-playlist" id="gmail-playlist-container"><li tabindex="4"><div class="gmail-playlist-item-image-container"><div class="gmail-video-item-duration-container gmail-playlist-item-duration-container"><span class="gmail-screen-reader-text">Video Duration 57 minutes 21 seconds </span><span aria-hidden="true" class="gmail-video-duration__duration">57:21</span></div><div class="gmail-responsive-image"><img class="gmail-playlist-item-image" src="https://cf-images.eu-west-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/665003303001/cfee744b-6214-4570-b379-2b11a80fad0e/9ab57c9d-1628-4cb7-a867-d64ee9d135f0/426x240/match/image.jpg?resize=730%2C410&quality=80" alt="One year of Israel’s war on Gaza: A war of firsts" width="426" height="240" style="margin-right: 25px;"></div></div><h3 class="gmail-playlist-item-title" title="One year of Israel’s war on Gaza: A war of firsts"> One year of Israel’s war on Gaza: A war of firsts
</h3></li></ul></div>
<p></p></div>
<p> </p>
<h2 id="gmail-what-has-the-us-said-and-done-so-far">What has the US said and done so far?</h2>
<p>After a months-long public push for a ceasefire in Gaza, the US has
shifted focus to supporting the Israeli offensive in Lebanon.</p>
<p>US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin endorsed an Israeli ground
campaign in south Lebanon last week which risks becoming a full-scale
invasion of the country.</p>
<p>“I made it clear that the United States supports Israel’s right to
defend itself,” Austin said in a statement on September 30 after a call
with his Israeli counterpart, Yoav Gallant.</p>
<p>“We agreed on the necessity of dismantling attack infrastructure along the border to ensure that <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/10/6/live-israel-carries-out-very-violent-bombing-campaign-on-beirut">Lebanese Hezbollah</a>
cannot conduct October 7-style attacks on Israel’s northern
communities,” Austin said, referring to the attack by the Palestinian
group Hamas on southern Israel during which at least 1,139 people were
killed.</p>
<p>The Lebanese group had started attacking Israeli military positions
in October last year in what it said was an effort to pressure the
Israeli government to end its war on Gaza, which it launched after the
Hamas attack.</p>
<p>For months, the near-daily clashes were largely contained to the
border area. The violence pushed tens of thousands of people from both
sides of the border to flee. Hezbollah argued that the residents of
Israel’s north can return only when the country ends its war on Gaza.</p>
<p>After an assassination campaign against Hezbollah’s top military officials, Israel launched an enormous <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/10/3/live-beirut-bombed-as-hezbollah-battles-israeli-army-in-south-lebanon">bombing campaign</a> across Lebanon, destroying civilian homes across hundreds of villages and towns late on September 23.</p>
<p>Since then, the Israeli violence <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/7/israel-steps-up-lebanon-bombing-as-hezbollah-attacks-haifa">has displaced</a> more than 1 million people in Lebanon.</p>
<p>Before this Israeli escalation, the White House had been saying for
months that it was working towards a diplomatic solution to the crisis
at the Lebanon-Israel border. US envoy <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/6/17/us-envoy-meets-with-israeli-leaders-as-tensions-with-hezbollah-escalate">Amos Hochstein</a> made repeated visits to the region, ostensibly to warn against escalation.</p>
<p>With the low-level hostilities rapidly turning into an all-out war in
Lebanon, the Biden administration rallied Arab and European countries
and proposed on September 25 an “immediate” <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/9/26/us-france-lead-call-for-temporary-ceasefire-along-israel-lebanon-border">21-day ceasefire</a> to stop the fighting.</p>
<p>Yet, two days later, when Israel <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/9/28/hassan-nasrallah-hezbollah-leader-killed-in-beirut-in-israeli-strike">assassinated Nasrallah</a>
in a huge bomb attack that levelled several residential buildings in
Beirut and effectively killed any prospect of an imminent ceasefire, the
White House lauded the attack as a “measure of justice”. Nasrallah’s
killing was ordered by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from US
soil, where he was attending the United Nations General Assembly in New
York.</p><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-8 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_10398" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"><div class="gmail-vjs-poster" aria-disabled="false"><span class="gmail-vjs-poster" tabindex="-1"><img alt="" src="https://cf-images.eu-west-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/665003303001/1a3389ce-e93d-40d4-9976-e0efde5f1e25/4c92bf8c-3e50-460d-b35e-cd607be30ecf/1920x1080/match/image.jpg" width="435" height="245" style="margin-right: 0px;"></span></div><div class="gmail-vjs-text-track-display"><div style="margin:1.5%"></div></div></span></div></div></div><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-8 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_10398" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"></span></div><div class="gmail-video-duration__brand-bar"><span class="gmail-screen-reader-text">Video Duration 1 minutes 33 seconds </span><span aria-hidden="true" class="gmail-video-duration__duration">1:33</span></div></div>
<p></p></div>
<p> </p>
<p>Osamah Khalil, a history professor at Syracuse University, questioned
the sincerity of Biden’s diplomatic efforts, raising doubt over media
reports that Hochstein urged restraint from Israel.</p>
<p>Khalil stressed that the US had been a direct participant and backer
of Israel’s actions in Gaza and the rest of the region, but that the
Biden administration used ceasefire talks as a “domestic politics” ploy
to shield itself from criticism at home.</p>
<p>“All this was negotiations for the sake of negotiations, particularly
as the war became increasingly unpopular,” Khalil told Al Jazeera last
month.</p>
<h2 id="gmail-reshape-the-middle-east">‘Reshape the Middle East’</h2>
<p>Two recent US media reports appear to validate Khalil’s assertion.</p>
<p>Politico reported on September 30, citing unidentified sources, that
senior US officials – including Hochstein and Brett McGurk, the National
Security Council coordinator for the Middle East – have privately
backed an Israeli military push <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/program/newsfeed/2024/10/7/hezbollah-rocket-attack-on-haifa">against Hezbollah</a>.</p>
<p>“Behind the scenes, Hochstein, McGurk and other top U.S. national
security officials are describing Israel’s Lebanon operations as a
history-defining moment — one that will reshape the Middle East for the
better for years to come,” the US publication <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2024/09/30/us-israel-military-hezbollah-00181797" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>.</p><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-9 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_11816" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"><div class="gmail-vjs-poster" aria-disabled="false"><span class="gmail-vjs-poster" tabindex="-1"><img alt="" src="https://cf-images.eu-west-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/665003303001/7132d661-cfe2-4cc9-a3f5-a2e4b36e2ebb/3dd132ad-db4c-46a3-8e70-31d9e5de0eab/1920x1080/match/image.jpg" width="435" height="245" style="margin-right: 0px;"></span></div><div class="gmail-vjs-text-track-display"><div style="margin:1.5%"></div></div></span></div></div></div><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-9 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_11816" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"></span></div><div class="gmail-video-duration__brand-bar"><span class="gmail-screen-reader-text">Video Duration 9 minutes 04 seconds </span><span aria-hidden="true" class="gmail-video-duration__duration">9:04</span></div></div>
<p></p></div>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Separately, <a href="https://www.axios.com/2024/10/04/israel-lebanon-hezbollah-new-leader-us" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Axios</a>
reported last week that the US is trying to take advantage of the blows
Israel has dealt on Hezbollah by pushing for the election of a Lebanese
president supported by Washington.</p>
<p>The Lebanese presidency has <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/30/president-michael-aoun-leaves-office-as-lebanons-crisis-worsens">been vacant</a> for nearly two years, with the parliament unable to find a consensus to choose a new leader.</p>
<p>On Tuesday, US Department of State spokesperson Matthew Miller
described the war in Lebanon as an “opportunity” to change the country
politically. He said Washington wanted the Lebanese people to have “the
ability to elect a new president [and] the ability to break the
stalemate that Hezbollah has had over the country”.</p>
<p>Hezbollah and its allies control dozens of seats in the Lebanese parliament as a result of free elections in the country.</p>
<p>Reshaping the region has always been a goal for the US
neoconservative movement, which promotes support for Israel and
elevating US-friendly governments through hawkish foreign policy and
military interventions. That approach was most clearly visible under
former US President <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/5/19/freudian-slip-bush-decries-invasion-of-iraq-not-ukraine">George W Bush</a>.</p>
<p>In fact, during the Bush tenure 18 years ago, when Israel had its
last major war with Hezbollah, then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
spoke of the “birth pangs of a new Middle East”.</p>
<p>Khalil noted that many neoconservatives of the Bush era are now
affiliated with the Democratic Party and backing Vice President Kamala
Harris for the presidency in the November election.</p>
<p>Harris has welcomed the endorsement of former Vice President Dick
Cheney, one of the top architects of the so-called “war on terror” and
the 2003 US-led <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2023/4/5/iraq-war-20-years-on-visualising-the-impact-of-the-invasion">invasion of Iraq</a>.</p>
<p>As the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Biden himself
backed the war in Iraq. So did Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who
served as a Democratic staffer on the panel at that time. McGurk was an
adviser in the Bush White House and played a key role in the US
occupation of Iraq, while Hochstein previously served in the Israeli
military.</p>
<p>“You have a neoconservative agenda inside the Democratic administration,” Khalil said.</p><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-10 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_13234" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"><div class="gmail-vjs-poster" aria-disabled="false"><span class="gmail-vjs-poster" tabindex="-1"><img alt="" src="https://cf-images.eu-west-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/665003303001/abac0b21-bea3-49ff-84fc-2ea05898c6b1/8cfafc4f-d059-464a-b100-adbc3cd9bfb1/1920x1080/match/image.jpg" width="435" height="245" style="margin-right: 0px;"></span></div><div class="gmail-vjs-text-track-display"><div style="margin:1.5%"></div></div></span></div></div></div><div style="display:block;min-width:0px;max-width:770px"><div class="gmail-video-player-facade-container"><div class="gmail-aj-video-player gmail-in-article-bc-video-player gmail-aj-parsed-component"><span class="gmail-video-js gmail-vjs-paused gmail-vjs-controls-enabled gmail-vjs-touch-enabled gmail-vjs-workinghover gmail-vjs-v8 gmail-vjs-user-active gmail-vjs-layout-medium gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default gmail-bc-player-6tKQRAx7lu_default-index-10 gmail-vjs-ad-controls gmail-vjs-ima3-html5 gmail-vjs-plugins-ready gmail-pause-controller gmail-vjs-player-info gmail-vjs-contextmenu-ui gmail-vjs-viewability gmail-vjs-errors gmail-vjs-quality-menu gmail-vjs-hide-controls" id="gmail-vjs_video_13234" tabindex="-1" lang="en" role="region" aria-label="Video Player"></span></div><div class="gmail-video-duration__brand-bar"><span class="gmail-screen-reader-text">Video Duration 0 minutes 29 seconds </span><span aria-hidden="true" class="gmail-video-duration__duration">0:29</span></div></div>
<p></p></div>
<p> </p>
<h2 id="gmail-gaza-failures">Gaza failures</h2>
<p>As the war rages in Lebanon and the world watches for a possible escalation between <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/program/inside-story/2024/10/4/could-israel-and-iran-go-to-war">Iran and Israel</a>, many analysts say Biden’s failure to put an end to the war in Gaza is what has brought the region to this point.</p>
<p>Khalil Jahshan, the executive director of the Arab Center Washington
DC, also said the Biden administration’s unconditional support for the
Netanyahu government is taking the entire region to “the unknown”.</p>
<p>In the year since the Gaza war began, Jahshan told Al Jazeera that
the US has shown “total blind support” for not only Israeli policies,
but “for Israeli excesses”, as well.</p>
<p>“This is the result of a one-sided policy that refused to accept any
element of rationality from the beginning of this conflict,” he said.</p>
<p>Almost immediately after Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Biden voiced <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/sports/2023/7/20/womens-world-cup-can-anyone-dethrone-the-us-football-team">uncompromising support</a> for the US ally.</p>
<p>He backed a “swift, decisive and overwhelming” Israeli response against Hamas. The White House also rushed to seek <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/3/us-house-passes-14-5bn-military-aid-package-for-israel">additional funds</a> from Congress for military aid to Israel to help finance the war.</p>
<p>Washington resisted calls for a ceasefire despite the growing
humanitarian crisis for months, arguing that Israel had a “right” to go
after Hamas.</p>
<p>Recent reporting by <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/9/24/blinken-ignored-us-assessments-that-israel-blocked-aid-to-gaza-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ProPublica</a> and the <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/4/white-house-warned-of-risk-of-israeli-war-crimes-days-after-oct-7-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Reuters</a>
news agency showed that the Biden administration received and ignored
internal warnings about possible Israeli war crimes in Gaza and pushed
on with its arms transfers to Israel.</p>
<img class="gmail-size-arc-image-770 gmail-wp-image-3069242" src="https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/2024-07-21T192202Z_1479644177_RC2YU3AYJJZG_RTRMADP_3_USA-ELECTION-BIDEN-1721863244.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C576&quality=80" alt="Netanyahu and Biden" width="435" height="325" style="margin-right: 25px;">Biden embraces Netanyahu in Tel Aviv, October 18, 2023 [Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters]
<p>As domestic and international discontent grew after Israel razed
large parts of Gaza, displaced nearly all of the Palestinian territory’s
2.3 million inhabitants and brought them to the verge of famine, Biden
began to soften his tone.</p>
<p>In recent months, the US adopted the term “ceasefire” to call <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/8/17/biden-says-gaza-ceasefire-in-sight-warns-against-efforts-to-undermine-deal">for a deal</a>
that would see an end to the fighting in Gaza and the release of
Israeli captives held by Palestinian groups in the besieged enclave.</p>
<p>But it has done little to pressure Netanyahu to accept an agreement.</p>
<p>Whether Biden and his aides truly wanted a ceasefire and failed to
achieve it or they used the diplomatic push as a distraction from the
horrors of Israel’s US-backed war, the result is the same – an expanding
war and tens of thousands of innocent people getting killed.</p>
<p>“The evidence suggests that it’s politically advantageous for them to
say they support a ceasefire, but not do anything to actually secure
it,” said Ryan Costello, a policy director at the National Iranian
American Council (NIAC), a US-based group that promotes US diplomacy
with Tehran.</p>
<p>Jahshan also said that the Biden administration did not offer fair ceasefire proposals as it continued to arm Israel.</p>
<p>“What’s the value of a ceasefire if those who are offering it
continue to offer the tools of war to one of the parties,” he said.
“That’s not a ceasefire; that’s an invitation to continue the fight.”</p><li tabindex="4"><br> <div class="gmail-playlist-item-image-container"><div class="gmail-video-item-duration-container gmail-playlist-item-duration-container"></div></div></li></div>