Your turn: President Biden's trip to Israel a chance for relevance
You can probably tell that I am no fan of President Biden.
However, I applaud his effort to make some difference in the Israeli-Hamas war and its likely extension to Hezbollah in Lebanon. He is more likely to get in the way than to help, but it is worth a try.
Unfortunately, the basic problem is beyond remedy. That is, both Hamas and Hezbollah want to destroy Israel. They have invested seventy years in this conflict, years that they could have used to turn their territories into flourishing states, and they have so thoroughly trained their people to hate that they cannot easily change course.
This made Biden’s trip dangerous. There are so many radicals who see Israel as “the Little Satan” and the United States as “the Great Satan” that the temptation is strong to cut off the enemy’s head.
There is no completely safe place in Israel to land. Hezbollah has an estimated 150,000 missiles ready to fire, and while Hamas largely depleted its stock in overwhelming Israel’s Iron Dome in the first day of the war, it must have a few in reserve. While Iran provides the money and arms that keep Hamas going, there is sizeable support everywhere in the Muslim world, and many nations are struggling to control their own religious radicals.
Why do they hate Israel so? There is of course the freedom that women have, the toleration of homosexuals, and the festivals where young people can get high drink, and dance. (The first target of Hamas was a rave right on the Gaza border that had attracted young people from around the world. Because the organizers disarmed everyone, Hamas was able to kill 260 partygoers.) But the fundamental reason for hating Israel is that it exists on what Hamas insists has always been Arab land.
Biden may well succeed in delaying Israel’s advance into Gaza, and he may persuade Jordan to stay out of the war, but if he had hoped to change Egypt’s policy of keeping out Gaza citizens, that seems unlikely.
At least, no visit to Cairo has been announced. Moreover, no Arab state wants to take in Gaza refugees. The reasons are complicated, but foremost must be that they do not want to bring in more religious fundamentalists.
Biden’s motives for the trip are complicated, too, but certainly his poor poling numbers must be important. We can only wish him good luck.
And we can warn our enemies that the United States would not take an effort to assassinate our president lightly.
Not even the many who disagree with Biden’s policies would go into the streets to celebrate as Hamas’s supporters did in Europe and here in America when the news reported that gunmen and rockets had killed some 1300 Israelis in one day.
William Urban is a retired Lee L. Morgan professor of history and international studies at Monmouth College.
This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Your turn: President Biden's trip to Israel a chance for relevance
