Consider This from NPR - Are Biden And Netanyahu Breaking On The War Between Israel And Hamas?

Episode Date: February 12, 2024

The question looming over the war between Israel and Hamas is what will happen what will happen to Rafah, the city in southern Gaza. More than half of Gaza's population has sought refuge there–an estimated one and a half million people.Israel says that in order to defeat Hamas, it needs to bring the war to Rafah. The Biden administration says a military operation in Rafah cannot proceed. Is this a hairline crack or the beginning of a rift between the U.S. and Israel that could reverberate across the region?President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanayhu's visions for the future of the war in Gaza are beginning to look irreconcilable. What does that mean for Biden's steadfast support of Israel?For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

President Biden has a go-to anecdote to describe his long and complicated relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister. I've known Bibi for now 51 years. He told it last year at a White House Hanukkah reception. Biden says Netanyahu has a photo of the two of them from when Biden was a 32-year-old senator and Netanyahu was serving in Israel's Foreign Service. And I wrote on the top of Bibi, I love you, but I don't agree with the damn thing you had to say. In the present moment, that is not quite true. Biden and Netanyahu agree that Israel has a right to continue its war in Gaza after the Hamas attacks that killed some 1,200 Israelis last year.

The U.S. continues to supply arms to Israel. It has also blocked a United Nations resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. But even back at that event in December, Biden hinted at disagreements about how Israel was conducting its war. We have to be careful. We have to be careful. The whole world's public opinion can shift overnight. We can't let that happen. As the war in Gaza has dragged on, Biden's Secretary of State, his National Security Advisor, and his Defense Secretary have each urged Israel publicly and privately to exercise restraint to avoid civilian deaths. And yet, the Palestinian death toll has now passed 28,000, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza. More than 12,000 of those dead

are children or young teenagers. The conduct of the response in the Gaza Strip has been over the top. In remarks to reporters last week, Biden's stern warnings gave way to public frustration. There are a lot of innocent people who are starving, a lot of innocent people who are in trouble and dying, and it's got to stop. Consider this, Biden and Netanyahu's visions for the future of the war in Gaza are beginning to look irreconcilable. What does that mean for Biden's steadfast support of Israel?

From NPR, I'm Mary Louise Kelly. It's Monday, February 12th. It's Consider This from NPR. The question looming over the war in Gaza at this moment is this. What will happen to the southern city of Rafah? More than half of Gaza's population has sought refuge there, an estimated one and a half million people. Israel says that in order to defeat Hamas, it needs to bring the war to Rafah. The Biden administration says that would be a disaster. Look, we have been absolutely clear that under the current circumstances in Rafah,

a military operation now in that area cannot proceed. That's Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, speaking with NPR on Friday. On Sunday, the White House says Biden reiterated that position in a phone call with Netanyahu. So is this a hairline crack or the beginning of a rift between the U.S. and Israel? And how might it reverberate across the region? To unpack those questions, I spoke to Ambassador Dennis Ross. He spent more than a decade as the Mideast Special Envoy for both the George H.W. Bush administration and the Clinton administration. So start right with this current moment. We have President Biden warning Prime Minister Netanyahu, do not invade Rafah.

That would be a disaster. We have Netanyahu saying Hamas cannot be destroyed unless they invade Rafah. Do you see any middle ground between those two positions? Well, I do see a middle ground. I think the Prime Minister is probably right that you can't succeed in demilitarizing Gaza and, in effect, demilitarizing Hamas unless, in fact, you're able to deal with Rafah, both from the standpoint that

there are probably four battalions of Hamas fighters there, on the one hand, but also that border of Egypt and Jordan, I'm sorry, Egypt and Gaza, has been kind of a sieve. So you really need to be there to prevent that or at least work out something between Egypt and Israel. But then again, this million and a half people who are there who have been told to go there because they'll be safe.

I was going to say, there's sort of two ways that you bridge these differences. The first way is that the people who are there are going to have to be evacuated, but you can't simply evacuate them unless you have someplace else for them to go within Gaza, and that someplace else for them to go within Gaza also has to be able to receive them, meaning you have to have humanitarian assistance that can go to them. You have to create shelter for them. So if, in fact, the Israelis are going to go to Rafah, in the Rafah, to deal with that military dimension of Hamas, they have to come up with a plan that is workable for evacuating people, and there has to be some place in Gaza for them to go.

The ground has to be prepared from a humanitarian standpoint to be able to absorb them. The second area where you have to work something out is between Egypt and Israel, because Egypt made it very clear it's not in favor of Israel doing this unless this is understood between the two of them. Ambassador, setting aside the specifics of how they may or may not work that out, to the question of the U.S.-Israel relationship and these increasingly stern warnings we are hearing from the Biden administration, I pose the question, is this a hairline crack in the relationship or a deeper rift? What do you think? Well, I don't think it's fundamental to the relationship, but I do think it relates to the only American president who ever went to Israel during a war, who immediately comes to the defense of Israel in international forum, who has taken on some political water here for doing what he's done, stood up in many respects to a lot of international pressure to stand by Israel. So I think he feels that he has really put himself on the line. I think he's built a lot of political credit in Israel. And I think what he's seeking is a little bit more responsiveness from Prime Minister Netanyahu to the things that he's asking. Right. And that was widely seen as

part of the initial calculation that the U.S. would not sternly lecture Israel in any way in the hopes of being able to privately wield some influence behind the scenes. Has that worked? What leverage does the U.S. have here? Well, I think to some extent it has worked because there's, I think it needs to be understood within Israel because the hostages have been held because of the trauma of October 7th, because there's been no access for the Red Cross to the hostages. There's a powerful sentiment, not just in the right wing, but across the whole body politic, that Israel shouldn't be providing humanitarian assistance

at all until, in fact, the hostages are released or at least access is given to the hostages. That hasn't happened. And yet, because of the president, Israel did create humanitarian quarters. It has allowed humanitarian assistance to go in. Given the politics in Israel did create humanitarian quarters. It has allowed humanitarian assistance to go in. Given the politics in Israel right now, you wouldn't have seen that at all had it not been for the pressure from the United States and from President Biden. So it has worked. Obviously, it hasn't worked well enough, but I think to somehow argue that it hasn't worked at all is to ignore what the realities are. Let's apply everything you've just said again back to this current moment. If Israel does go ahead and send ground forces in in a major invasion of Rafah, as they have said they will do, should the Biden administration continue to stand as strongly as it has with Israel?

Well, I think it can stand strongly with Israel by making itself very clear and that Israel shouldn't do this. I would be very surprised if Israel will go ahead and do this without an evacuation plan. And here, I think the U.S. can work closely with them to help make that evacuation plan workable from a humanitarian standpoint. Okay. We have been speaking with Ambassador Dennis Ross, who spent more than a decade as the U.S. envoy to the Middle East for both President George H.W. Bush and President Clinton. He's now a distinguished fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Ambassador, thanks as always.

Pleasure. Thank you. This episode was produced by Connor Donovan, Brianna Scott, and Mark Rivers. It was edited by Courtney Dorning. Our executive producer is Sammy Yinnigan. It's Consider This. From NPR, I'm Mary Louise Kelly.