Oakland, Ca. (Special to Informed Comment; Featured) – Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s Congressional address on Wednesday marked one of the most disturbing days in American History. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said that morning in an email blast, “It is a dark day in US history when an authoritarian with warrant requests from the International Criminal Court is allowed to address a joint session of Congress. 40,000 Palestinians are dead. Hostages aren’t home. Netanyahu is a war criminal. I will be boycotting his address.”
She spoke for many Democrats and independents. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, who did attend, said in advance, ““Benjamin Netanyahu is the worst leader in Jewish history since the Maccabean king who invited the Romans into Jerusalem over 2100 years ago. Prime Minister Netanyahu’s address to a joint session of Congress is . . .a cynical stunt aimed at aiding his own desperate political standing at home and meddling in domestic American politics only months before a highly consequential election. Prime Minister Netanyahu and his American allies are seeking to use the United States Congress, the greatest legislative body in the world, as the set for their next partisan advertisement, casting elected Members of Congress as glorified extras. . . tomorrow’s speech should not be happening. . . . As a lifelong Zionist, I am deeply committed to Israel’s fundamental security and opportunity to prosper. . . . For these reasons, and out of respect for the State of Israel and the office of the Prime Minister, I plan to attend . . I feel my voice is more impactful in the room, holding the Prime Minister accountable.”
The speech was a pep rally for a strange amalgam of Israel’s far right Likud Party and the MAGA GOP. Those two parties have been perversely aligned since Donald Trump and Netanyahu began campaigning for one another, which they did again in 2020. Both men are desperately trying to remain in power in order to avoid criminal consequences for their abuses of power. Netanyahu continues to prosecute a war in Gaza to distract Israel from his criminal charges. Trump seeks the presidency again to avoid criminal accountability and return to office, so he can dispense with American Democracy.
No foreign leader has ever meddled with US politics in such a presumptive and arrogant way as Netanyahu has, as if he is the superpower, and the US is the client state. Netanyahu has presumed to dictate to American presidents on each of his three prior addresses to Congress. His presence in Congress today was a divisive element that has splintered the Democratic caucus.
The absence of senior leadership was notable, especially the absence of Vice President Kamala Harris. That sent a huge message disapproval. Kamala cited a scheduling conflict for sitting this one out, though she was supposed to preside; but she didn’t want to be tarred with Netanyahu’s residue or any association with him.
While he framed the Gaza conflict as one between barbarism and civilization, and as a proxy war between the US and Iran, Netanyahu himself is responsible for much of the upheaval with his genocidal campaign and resulting global revulsion. His use of hostages and Israeli soldiers as props in Congress were acts of demagoguery.
The address was notable for what he did not say, as much as what he did. He made no mention of his own contributions to escalating the conflict, and acted as though the millions of American protesters, including Jews, were rooting for Hamas. No,, Mr. Netanyahu, they are demanding your resignation for the sake of Israel. While he noted that three Israeli hostages who escaped, he didn’t note that they were killed by Israeli troops apparently instructed to shoot down any adult males they saw in the open.
Netanyahu said he “wont rest until all loved ones are home,” but he has clearly made prosecuting the war to stay in office his priority, rather than negotiating a release of the hostages. That was one of many gas lighting elements, along with saying American protesters were rooting for Hamas. Objectors aren’t sympathizers of Hamas. They object to Netanyahu’s failed policies.
His called the protesters useful idiots of Iran and Hamas, while his own useful idiots in Congress treated him like their own president giving a State of the Union speech. His reference to the prophets and fathers don’t absolve Israel from being a colonialist state under him and other PMs going back to Menachem Begin.
Netanyahu’s demonization of American college presidents and other academics as antisemitic ignores his own role in exacerbating global antisemitism, by his openly genocidal policies, to heights unseen since World War II. Netanyahu himself is the demon demonizing Israel. Claiming a low ratio of non-combatant deaths to combatant deaths in Rafah is a lie of shocking magnitude, even for him. Then he characterized the 24 people killed as “practically none.”
The Times and the Sunday Times Video: “Congress protest calls Netanyahu a ‘war criminal’”
Then there was the Orwellian assertion that only Israel is standing in the way of a war between the US and Iran, while he is the most persistent instigator of such a horror. Israel is not fighting Iran on behalf of US. Israel is not protecting the US, but increasing our risks and compromising our international standing.
While he has a fantasy of a Gaza with a peaceful civilian administration, his undermining of the Palestine Authority, led by the secular-minded Fatah, destroyed that, while de facto inviting Hamas to fill the consequent leadership vacuum. Another Netanyahu fantasy is his proposed Abraham Alliance, which would build on the disastrous, dysfunctional Abraham Accords of Jared Kushner.
Clearly, the Israeli prime minister wants Donald Trump back in office to achieve his desired outcome, and thanked him for fulfilling his wish list while in office. Basking in the adulation of Republican sycophants, Netanyahu waved to the crowd like Mussolini, to whom he is much closer than to Churchill, though Churchill also displayed a colonial arrogance and disregard for the rights of the Palestinians that should be embarrassing to any contemporary leader.
Israeli journalist Barak Ravid said immediately afterward on CNN, “He didn’t take responsibility. He didn’t say he’d repair the damage he’s done.” With his 32% approval rating, he was speaking to Israelis as much as the Congress. Netanyahu tried to re-assert himself as the most influential Israeli politicians in the US, because his popularity at home is so weak with a 72% disapproval rating.
Perhaps the richest lie of the day was his boasting about limiting civilian casualties, which contradicts all information from the United Nations and international aid groups.
In response, Sen. Bernie Sanders said, “I think in Netanyahu you have somebody who is a war criminal, who is a demagogue. I think he’s a liar and I think in order to save his political skin in Israel — where he is enormously unpopular — he is prepared to starve hundreds of thousands of children in Gaza. It really sad that he was invited to speak before a joint session of Congress.”
© 2024 All Rights Reserved