Biden failed the Israel-Palestinian rocket and riot test - analysis
Biden’s mistakes began before the first rocket was fired: US Mideast policy expert
The policies of the Biden administration have inadvertently contributed to the lethal round of hostilities in Israel and Gaza, some Israeli analysts claimed on Wednesday.
The escalation “is a test and [US President Joe Biden] has failed,” said Prof. Eytan Gilboa, an expert on US policy in the Middle East at Bar-Ilan University.
Back in February, Biden lifted the designation of the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen as a global terrorist organization. Analysts said that the president believed the move would reduce violence in Yemen and against Saudi Arabia, but it has produced the opposite result.
“If you are a terrorist organization, and you don’t do anything and sanctions are lifted against you, this means you can do whatever you want,” Gilboa said. “Other terrorist organizations in the Middle East, like Hamas, look at this and say, ‘This is what the US is doing? Very good. We can exploit it.’”
In April, Biden announced that America would restore some $235 million in aid to the Palestinians that had been withdrawn by former President Donald Trump. About two-thirds of the money is being given to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which Trump cut off in 2018 because of its ties to terrorism.
“Hamas and Islamic Jihad were looking and saying to themselves that if the US restored this aid unconditionally, then we can do whatever we want,” Gilboa explained.
Finally, that same month, the US lifted sanctions on International Criminal Court prosecutor Fatou Bensouda, also without any conditions.
Amid the violence, the administration has likewise shown a lack of understanding of the situation, including falsely equating Israel with Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
Hamas and Islamic Jihad have been inciting violence and terrorism for weeks inside Israel and the Palestinian territories, and specifically on the Temple Mount, in response to a decision by the Palestinian Authority to cancel the elections that Hamas hoped to win. Their goal is to take over the West Bank and turn it into another Gaza, Gilboa said.
“The US is strengthening terrorist organizations who are against peace,” he said.