OUR DAILY THREAD: Trump Pulls Out Before Bibi Finishes
We're screwed
THE SET-UP: “Finish the job.” It’s been Netanyahu’s repeated refrain as Israel’s war widened from Gaza to Lebanon to Iran. What “finishing the job” looks like, though, is an open question.
For the casual observer in the United States, ”finishing the job” probably sounds like military defeat on the battlefield and an official act of surrender. It’s General Robert E. Lee at the Appomattox Court house or Japan’s Foreign Minister and a General officially capitulating aboard the USS Missouri.
Typically, the defeated army drops its guns and heads home to a nation suddenly under occupation by the winning army. After a ceremony on USS Missouri, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers in Japan drafted a constitution and oversaw the reconstruction of a country it had just destroyed with gravity, incendiary and nuclear bombs. In that case, finishing the job ultimately meant transforming an enemy into a staunch ally.
But that’s not what Israel seeks. Not by a longshot.
Benjamin Netanyahu set the tone early by immediately and repeatedly invoking the Biblical story of Amalek in the wake of Hamas’ October 7 attack. Here’s the New King James version of First Samuel 15:3:
Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them. But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.
That repeated call to eliminate Amalek in its current form—a.k.a. the people of Gaza—was echoed by Israeli politicians, by Israeli television, and by popular podcasters. For these Israelis—some of whom are in Netanyahu’s cabinet—when will the job be officially finished?
What does “victory” look like?
Gaza is the obvious answer. It is an unlivable, depopulated hellscape in which Israel incrementally takes more land and, in the meantime, it reserves the right to kill anyone still living there … all they need to say is “Hamas.” Because Hamas also functioned as a government that ran schools and hospitals and ambulances … it touched the lives of many Gazans. A touched or “Hamas-linked” life all the IDF needs to kill. It’s why the so-called “ceasefire” in Gaza has been violated on a nearly daily basis since it was declared.
There is no ceasefire, in fact. Israel reserves the right to kill anybody and their entire family if they are suspected or linked to Hamas. That means every Gazan is a viable target. It’s how they killed 19k Gazans under the age of 18 without a hint of remorse or shame. They were killing future Hamas-linked Gazans. As many Israeli politicians and citizens have said, there are no innocent Gazans. That’s why there isn’t a viable scenario for Hamas’ surrender. They know they’ll end up dead or consigned to a torturous prison system. And there is no home to go back to, anyway.
The same goes for Hezbollah.
It is a government and schools and healthcare and religious instruction. It, like Hamas, touches many lives that have nothing to do with rockets. In the past, Gazans and Lebanese were “mowed” like grass, just to maintain fear and control and to appease Israeli hawks.
Now mowing the grass is not enough.
Netanyahu set a new bar when he promised to “finish the job,” like he did during his infamous speech before a joint session of Congress on July 24, 2024. It was a seminal moment in the history of US-Israeli relations and, in retrospect, for Netanyahu.
Instead of acknowledging the political price his benefactor was paying for his support of Bibi’s brutality, he defied him, did an end-run and spoke to Congress. He basically said to Biden, “I can do whatever I want and you cannot stop me, or the aid my country depends upon.” Any concerns about the massive number of children being killed or orphaned fell by the wayside after Bibi soaked-in one standing ovation after another. He pulled the strings AIPAC attached to members of Congress and, in so doing, he spoke with an air of invincibility. He dismissed mounting concerns about Israel’s brutal campaign by framing the fight as Western Civilization against barbarians.
It was quite a ballsy display by a client state, particularly one that depends so heavily upon its benefactor. But Bibi probably felt fairly certain that Jared’s father-in-law would soon be President and then he could go even further in Gaza. That’s exactly what happened, too.
Once the phony ceasefire was in place, Israel then exported their Gaza model to Lebanon. They’d signaled their intent via pager. It showed Lebanon and the world that Israel is not above indiscriminate killing or the killing of bystanders. It also showed the world it can kill anyone, anywhere, at any time.
Hezbollah, like Hamas, arose in response to Israeli military power. But Israel doesn’t want anyone to think of Palestinian or Lebanese fighters as soldiers. They never refer them as “soldiers,” perhaps hoping the world will give them a pass from the Geneva Conventions because they are fighting “terrorists” instead of soldiers. Soldiers are human beings with some basic rights. Terrorists cede their rights because they are terrorists.
That die was cast in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. The US and its hyperpatriotic media called the people shooting at American invaders “terrorists” or, maybe, “fighters.” Most avoided terms that imbued Iraqis or Afghans with humanity.
The same is true of Iranians. It’s a nation-state with a standing army, but you never hear about Iran’s Army or Iranian soldiers. You do hear about the Revolutionary Guard, which is couched in the language of terrorism and referred to as a terrorist organization.
It’s also why infotainers, influencers and politicians make a point of saying “Iran is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism.” No evidence is given, nor is the term defined. But it is repeated with a Pavlovian reliability because no one challenges the assertion. What is the metric for measuring “state sponsors of terrorism,” anyway? Is there a point system? And what is a terrorist act? Or is all of this just an effective way to dehumanize your enemy?
Now, though, Netanyahu is a bit trapped by his rhetoric and his maximalist demands. Jared’s father-in-law is desperate. He wants to get Iran off his plate and give gas prices a chance to leave a good taste in the mouths of voters before the Midterms. He doesn’t care about Lebanon. He does care about Qatar, the UAE and Saudi Arabia.
And they want to get Hormuz open.
In the final analysis, Netanyahu hasn’t been motivated by Iran’s nuclear program. That’s the excuse, but Israel intelligence knows Iran was not making a bomb. It’s always been a bargaining chip. The Ayatollah Khamenei even issued a fatwa stating that nuclear weapons are haram. But Bibi knew that. He’s known that. The real reason to bomb Iran and Lebanon … is to cut Palestinians off from outside help and, in the process, stretch Israel’s functional hegemony to the borders of Türkiye, Afghanistan and Egypt.
They want Iran to be another regional failed state … a bombing range they can hit without consequence and in perpetuity. And that’s why hawkish Israelis should be grateful to Trump for giving them the weapons and the latitude to destroy Gaza and to destroy the lives of so many families. But they are not grateful. They are angry and confused by Trump’s desire to move on, his impending midterms catastrophe notwithstanding. Israel’s hawkish majority doesn’t want to move on. It seeks seek elimination.
Eliminate Hamas. Eliminate Hezbollah. Eliminate the Iranian regime. That’s what Bibi & Co. mean by “finish the job.”
And if they ever got close to doing so, they might realize they’ve become the monsters they claim to be fighting.
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