The Shift: Biden says U.S. won’t supply weapons for Rafah attack

Yesterday, President Biden said the United States government won’t supply Israel with certain weapons if the country invades Rafah, where over a million people are sheltering. It had previously been reported that the administration put a hold on a weapons shipment last week.

There’s some important context that’s predictably missing from most of the mainstream coverage.

The Biden administration has sent Israel billions in weapons since October 7th and the move won’t impair its ability to attack. Here’s PBS NewsHour’s Nick Schifrin explaining the decision:

Now, Israel has more than enough weapons…to be able to assault Rafah. So this is not about readiness. This is what one official tells me is a message. And that message is being sent also because the U.S. is saying, if Israel does not go into Rafah, then there will not be further frozen shipments, not only those 3,500 bombs that we talked about already, but a separate shipment of Joint Direct Attack Munition, or JDAMs.

These are kits that turn unguided munitions into precision-guided munitions that Israel is also asking for. But the U.S. is not blocking any defensive weapons — that includes missile defense — nor is it blocking recent appropriated financial — foreign financial money for Israeli weapons.

Also, the situation in Rafah is already horrific. Yesterday Politico interviewed UNRWA Deputy Director Scott Anderson, who says the IDF has already killed two dozen people there in the last 24 hours, including seven children.”

“Even an hour ago I could hear stuff. I haven’t for about an hour, but it was pretty active today,” said Anderson. “The other part of all this is anywhere there’s a concentration of IDF — it becomes a target. So every crossing today was hit by something. There is a more robust IDF presence now. There’s two brigades, one’s a specialist in tunnels and the other one were the perpetrators of the (World Central Kitchen) incident. Those are the two brigades operating now and in South Rafa.”

Suspending weapons might not have the impact some suspect, but it’s a notable diplomatic shift. Biden was immediately attacked by Israeli leaders, Republicans, and the Fetterman/Torres faction of the Democratic party.

“Hamas ❤️ Biden,” tweeted Israel’s fascist security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.

“The US is threatening not to give us precise missiles,” declared Israeli MK and Likud Official Tali Gottlieb. “Oh yeah? Well, I got news for the US. We have imprecise missiles. I’ll use it. I’ll just collapse ten..buildings. That’s what I’ll do.”

Amid his hush money trial Biden’s prospective presidential opponent Donald Trump criticized the move on Truth Social. “Crooked Joe Biden, whether he knows it or not, just said he will withhold weapons from Israel as they fight to eradicate Hamas Terrorists in Gaza,” he wrote. “Hamas murdered thousands of innocent civilians, including babies, and are still holding Americans hostage, if the hostages are still alive.”

Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) falsely claimed that Biden had imposed an arms embargo on Israel.

“Hard disagree and deeply disappointing,” tweeted Senator John Fetterman (D-PA).

“The irony is that Biden, after losing the support of everyone who opposed what Israel has been doing, will now lose the support of everyone who loves what Israel is doing. And all the while he facilitated a slaughter of historic proportions,” wrote The Intercept’s Ryan Grim. “For what?”

Indeed, for what?

In an interview about the issue with CNN’s Erin Burnett, Biden admitted that U.S. weapons have killed Palestinian civilians. Of course, everybody already knew that, but it’s the first time the administration has acknowledged reality.

Biden’s admission further exposes the central lies of his administration’s foreign policy. For months, the administration has insisted that Israel is an independent actor that the U.S. can’t simply boss around. Press inquiries about the latest round of horrors are met with the standard recipe of deflection. We don’t have all the details on that. We’re looking into it. We’re having conversations with Israel about this, but we can’t talk about. We continue to engage with Israel on this issue.

The suspension of weapons shows that Biden knows his bombs are killing people and he knows he could take major steps towards ending the carnage at any time.

Anti-Palestine Bills

Since October 7th congress members have introduced a flurry of preposterous bills. There’s a couple new ones worth noting.

Let’s start with H.R.6408. This one was introduced by Rep. David Kustoff (R-TN) last November. It had some co-sponsors, including two Democrats: Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Ritchie Torres (D-NY).

This bill would allow the executive branch the power to investigate and strip nonprofits of tax-exempt status based on allegations of terrorism support. As you can imagine, the parameters for supporting terrorism are purposely left vague and it’s clearly aimed at supporters of Palestine as Hamas and Hezbollah were both cited by Kustoff amid the legislative push. Why else would the effort exist, as there are already federal laws prohibiting organizations from supporting terrorism?

This one was rushed through the House last month, as part of the mini-Shock Doctrine that proceeded Iran’s retaliatory attack on Israel. Now the Senate is set to vote on it.

“There are absolutely no guardrails in terms of its potential impact,” the Center for Constitutional Rights’ Brad Parker told The New Republic at the time. “Even if it were seen as a legitimate approach and tool, without those guardrails, it really can be weaponized to criminalize any disfavored group at any time that the administration deems worthy of silencing or eliminating as a political threat.”

“We’ve already seen government officials conflate protesting students with Hamas or other terrorist groups,” reads an ACLU petition on the bill. “It isn’t a stretch to imagine how this bill could be used to pressure universities to shut down student groups and further criminalize dissent in this country. Knowing the U.S. government’s long history of abusive and discriminatory material support investigations and prosecutions in the post-9/11 era – disproportionately against Muslims and charities – we cannot allow this bill to pass.”

Next let’s turn to S.4274, an absolutely bonkers piece of legislation that was introduced this week by Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS).

This one would designate student protesters as terrorists and put them on the No Fly List” for the crime of protesting Israel, which it classifies as “violence against the Jewish people.”

“Hamas terrorist sympathizers don’t just hate Israel, they hate America and everything we stand for. These Far-Left paid professional agitators are promoting terrorism with no fear of the consequences from this Administration and these University Presidents who are coddling them to safeguard their donor lists,” said Marshall in a statement.

“These radical Marxists who are doing Hamas’ bidding across the country on college campuses, threatening the safety of our Jewish students and communities, should be treated the same way we treat the terrorist organizations they are pledging their support to and immediately be placed on the TSA No Fly List,” he continued.

It’s easy to dismiss this stuff as laughable GOP hijinks, as there’s probably not much chance this gets passed. However, I’m reminded of something University of Chicago professor Darryl Li told me earlier this year. Li is the author of a report detailing how anti-Palestinian sentiment shaped U.S. anti-terror laws. Here’s Li:

One of the messages that I think is really important for the movement to understand is that proposals that don’t get formally passed into law but still sort of circulate in the air can have really important and harmful effects.

So, in Congress, we’ve seen this incentive structure, a sort of race to the bottom of racist grandstanding against Palestinians. That’s actually existed for decades, and there’s no downside for most people in Congress to come up with increasingly wild and disturbing legislative proposals. And even if 90% of them don’t pass they still kind of shape the position of the Overton Window.

So what I tell people is, you have to pay attention to these really outlandish and extreme proposals but don’t take your eye off the ball in terms of other ideas that might seem a little more moderate in comparison.

Odds & Ends

🇵🇸 Gazans salute university students’ uprising for Palestine

🗳️ Student resistance to the Gaza genocide is spurring a crisis for Democrats and the progressive coalition

🇺🇸 Inside the Biden administration sham to convince the world Netanyahu wants a ceasefire

🏫 ‘We are doing this in solidarity with the people of Gaza’: a Princeton student explains why he’s currently part of a hunger strike

🇺🇸 Don’t be fooled – Biden is the real antisemite

🇺🇸 Genocide Joe is beginning to stink like Lyndon B. Johnson 

🇮🇱 Truthout: Amid Rafah Siege, Biden Officials Delay Report on Alleged Israeli War Crimes

🏫 Counterpunch: The Distortion of Campus Protests over Gaza

🏫 NPR: What we can learn from 4 schools that have reached agreements with Gaza protesters

⛺ In These Times: “Not Mere Pixels on a Screen”: What Chicago’s Student Encampments Actually Look Like

🏫 Jewish Currents: Who Has the Right to “Disrupt” the University?

💰 The Intercept: As Biden Warns Against Rafah Invasion, AIPAC Pushes Congress to Support Israel’s Operation

🤑 Democratic billionaire donor Haim Saban sent an angry email to Biden over his Rafah warning. “Let’s not forget that there are more Jewish voters who care about Israel, than Muslim voters that care about Hamas,” he writes.

Uncommitted National Movement put out a statement in response:

Haim Saban’s bigoted comments evoke painful memories of the post-9/11 era, where broad and unfair assumptions turned communities into suspects, underscoring a dangerous ‘with us or against us’ mentality.”

We must resist such bigoted views to prevent history’s shadows from darkening our collective pursuit to save lives in Gaza and achieve a just and peaceful future for Palestinians, Israelis, and Americans.

🗣️ JVP Action Executive Director Stefanie Fox, on Biden conditioning weapons:

“Biden’s statement is as necessary as it is over overdue. The U.S. already bears responsibility for months of catastrophic devastation: The nearly 40,000 Palestinians that the Israeli military has killed, the two million Palestinians being intentionally brought to the brink of famine, the decimation of all universities and almost every hospital in Gaza. Today’s statement shows that Biden can no longer ignore the will of the majority of Americans who want a permanent ceasefire, release of all hostages, and an end to US complicity in Israeli war crimes. The Netanyahu regime and President Biden alike have positioned this ongoing genocide as a benefit to Jewish life and safety, and for months tens of thousands of American Jews have called out: Not in our names!”

🇮🇱 New York Daily News: Man ID’d as cousin of controversial Rabbi Meir Kahane arrested for ramming NYC pro-Palestinian protester

📊 Zeteo: A Majority of Democratic Voters Believe Israel Is Committing Genocide