Israel Is Waiting for Biden, And This Will Likely Do Harm

After a visit to the Middle East and the “Leper Summit” in Tehran, the United States is being forced to come to terms with with a harsh reality, which includes a real threat against its vital interests. Its need to fight for a global order under its leadership is an opportunity for Israel. This does not mean that Joe Biden is up to the challenge, and Israel must not depend on him for important regional processes.

Given the fanfare over President Biden’s visit, it can be said that despite its potential for strategic change in the region, the visit accomplished only part of this. But the possibility for change still exists. The central question now is to what extent changes in American attitude will lead to changes in the regional reality down the road.

The visit demonstrated (among other things in the Jerusalem Declaration) the basic intimacy that characterizes Israel-U.S. relations and the American commitment to Israel’s security and joint interest in advancing relations between Israel and Arab states. At the same time, it highlighted the difference between the sides over the Iranian and Palestinian issues.

Looking forward, the visit reflects how difficult it is for America to recognize the new reality in the wake of the war in Ukraine and the failure to resurrect the nuclear agreement with Iran. This reality is forcing Biden to comes to terms, gradually and reluctantly, with the fact that similar factors threatening the global order and the rules on which it is based are, therefore, threatening vital American interests. These factors, Russia, China and Iran, also threaten the regional order in the Middle East, a situation that requires cooperation with the opposition.

In the course of the visit, Biden again indicated that it is necessary for the United States to return to the region to avoid a vacuum that Russia and China could fill given their cooperation with Iran. Therefore, given the economic implications of the war in Ukraine, Biden set his human rights agenda and pride aside, and went to the prison in Jeddah. This approach stands in tension with the president’s basic philosophy and has not been formulated in a fully recognizable way. There are a number of people in the Democratic Party who are resisting the administration’s approach and its implications.

The president’s policy reflects a growing weakness in America’s status as a superpower in the region. The Iranians and Saudis recognize this and are taking a tough position with respect to what America expects from them. Iran's aggressive statements following the visit, led by the words of the adviser to Iranian leader Ali Khamenei on the possibility of advancing nuclear weapons capability and Saudi Arabia’s failure to provide an immediate response to America’s request for increased increase oil production, made clear how much the U.S. position in the region has slipped, particularly since its embarrassing withdrawal from Afghanistan. This weakened image also harms the standing of U.S. allies, which are hesitant to confront Iran. At the same time, it indicates all the more how important Israel is in openly challenging Tehran’s efforts to achieve regional hegemony.

The Change in How America Is Perceived – Opportunity for Israel

However, the United States is the world’s most important superpower, and allying with the U.S. to prevent a change in the regional order is a positive development from Israel’s side. We must now examine, in cooperation with the Americans, how we can advance this goal together with other countries who share the fear that radical factions in Iran are growing stronger. The idea of a joint regional defense structure did not get much traction during Biden’s visit, but there is no reason to dismiss it. We should examine ways to promote the concept, perhaps based on territorial cooperation between Israel, the United States and each of the pragmatic Arab states according to their needs. The visit by the Israel Defense Forces chief of staff to Morocco is a step in this direction.

In any case, until recently, the American focus on tensions with Russia and China detracted from a meeting of interests between the United States, Israel and the Gulf states, the latter of which do not see Russia and China as threats to their security. Washington’s changed approach is fixing that as a matter of strategic cooperation. The primary joint goal for Israel and the pragmatic Arab states is to translate this meeting of interests into a change in American policy toward Iran and prepare the United States to clearly exert pressure on the extremist Islamic regime with action including credible military threats against Iran to block its nuclear program. Everything should be done to remove the dangerous option of returning to the nuclear agreement from the agenda.

And now, Israel should leverage the Russian president’s visit to Iran, the tightening of relations between the two countries and Iran’s aggressive behavior to bring the Americans closer to adopting a firmer policy on Iran.

At the same time, Israel should prepare to deal with the inherent risks of this development including a more aggressive Russian approach against Israel’s freedom of operations in the skies over Syria and continued attempts by Iran and its proxies to exploit the image of American weakness in pursuing their objectives. Iran, which has already exploited this weakness in order to significantly advance its nuclear program without any reaction by the United States, could present new challenges to the U.S. In addition, Hezbollah could test Israeli resolve with respect to the Karish gas field.

Apparently, the visit also somewhat contributed to normalizing relations and peace with pragmatic Arab states, which allowed for possible flights in Saudi airspace and an agreement, in principle, of direct flights from Israel. Again, it is worth pointing out the potential of continuing to tighten economic and technology relations between Israel and the Arab states, despite Palestinian opposition. It is becoming increasingly clear to the Americans that attempts by the Palestinians to present themselves as representatives of the Islamic and Arab world does not hold water. Saudi Arabia, which is committed to the Arab peace initiative, is stipulating that normalization depends on Israel accepting most of the Palestinian demands, and it can do nothing more right now. However, the Saudi move has finally breached the dam, and prospects are that it will collapse. In this context, we should note that during a joint press conference with Prime Minister Yair Lapid, Biden specifically referred to the Abraham Accords and was not completely satisfied with referring to normalization, as his administration is prone to do.

Lapid Helps Palestinians Avoid Responsibility

Naturally, the Palestinian issue was relegated to the sidelines during the visit, given Biden’s understanding that under current conditions there is no chance of advancing the peace process, among other things. The Gaza shooting was apparently meant to express Palestinian frustration (and to challenge the Palestinian Authority). However, the image of Palestinians as eternal victims has been thrown into sharp relief; they should be compensated given the limited engagement in their cause and a failure to respond to their strategic demands.

Israel made gestures meant to appease Abu Mazen* and Biden together, and America promised support without getting anything in return from the Palestinians all while taking security risks (Palestinian construction in sensitive regions and the intelligence challenge of introducing 4G into Palestinian communications). These things are likely to deepen the feeling in Palestine that is worthwhile to continuously refuse to cooperate, and that, in the end, the Israelis and Americans will reconcile themselves to the indecent Palestinian convention of paying salaries to terrorists and memorializing the refugee issue through aid to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East despite the fact the organization continues to incite Palestinian youth against Israel through school programming.

Again, we can see how ignoring the role of the Palestinians in perpetuating conflict and struggle against the Zionists is demonstrated. Lapid missed an opportunity to make it clear that Palestine is responsible for this impasse when the press questioned him about his position on a two-state solution. Instead of clarifying the difference between “two states” and “two states for two peoples,” where one state is Jewish while emphasizing the security needs of the State of Israel, he was satisfied to respond casually by expressing support for the two-state solution. In fact, during a speech after meeting with Abu Mazen, Biden used the terminology “two states for two peoples” and stood on the claim that for both peoples, there are deep roots in the land. (The trouble is that the rest of the components of the formula that Biden presented are problematic from Israel’s perspective.)

In short, the possibility of positive change is developing in a regional context. That said, if it is delayed or never realized because of Biden’s inhibitions, the likelihood will increase that the elements challenging the current order will exploit the status of the United States and try to advance the order they desire, increasing the risks to Israel and regional stability.

*Editor’s Note: Abu Mazen is also known as Mahmoud Abbas, president of the State of Palestine and the Palestinian National Authority.