After attack on Israel, why US leadership matters profoundly

Overnight, the United States’ historically strong relationship with Israel has been shocked back into place.

Just three weeks after President Joe Biden met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the United Nations – notably, not at the White House – the two leaders are back in sync. The brutal weekend attack on Israel by the militant Islamist group Hamas has plunged the nation and the neighboring Gaza Strip into war, with the U.S. now back to a “whatever-it-takes” posture in defending the Jewish state.

The Gaza-based Hamas’ surprise attack, dubbed Israel’s 9/11 for the unprecedented toll and intelligence failure, has also shined a light on the internal leadership struggles facing the U.S. Congress is in disarray with another funding deadline looming and the House unable to function, with Wednesday’s speakership vote postponed. But at this moment of crisis, a sense of unity has emerged, with strong majorities of both parties condemning Hamas’ actions and backing Israel.

President Biden’s remarks Tuesday, calling the assault “pure, unadulterated evil,” struck observers for their unequivocal nature. There was no call for compromise, no hint of both-sides-ism. The president said he told Prime Minister Netanyahu that if the U.S. had experienced such an attack, “our response would be swift, decisive, and overwhelming.” He also emphasized the need to behave “according to the rule of law.”

Israel’s announcement Wednesday of an emergency wartime Cabinet, including the right-wing Mr. Netanyahu as prime minister and a more centrist opposition politician, retired Gen. Benny Gantz, demonstrated its own national unity.

From the American perspective, the war has reinforced the primacy of the role of the U.S. in supporting and protecting Israel since its founding in 1948, as well as the wider, decadeslong U.S. role in fostering regional peace initiatives.

“The president of the United States is indispensable,” says David Makovsky, director of the Koret Project on Arab-Israel Relations at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

And during this time of crisis, Mr. Makovsky adds, “It’s important that the region sees that America stands with Israel, as it seeks to restore a sense of deterrence that it believes has been lost amid this imagery of American-Israel division and a sense that America was retrenching away from the Middle East.”

Complications over funding 

U.S.-Israeli relations had suffered in recent times over Mr. Netanyahu’s plan for a judicial overhaul that critics warned could undermine Israeli democracy. Still, the U.S. continued to work at fostering normalization of Israeli relations with Saudi Arabia, a follow-on to the Trump-era Abraham Accords, which established formal ties between Israel and several Mideast and North African countries.

Now such efforts with Saudi Arabia appear to be on hold as Israel’s war with Hamas intensifies. Other regional issues have also risen to the fore, namely Iran’s reported role in green-lighting and funding the Hamas attack on Israel – and most important, whether the $6 billion in Iranian assets recently unfrozen by the U.S. as a part of a prisoner swap were instrumental in funding the Hamas attack.

Biden administration officials say that Iran has not yet spent any of the unfrozen funds. On Wednesday, at a press conference in Morocco, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen kept open the possibility of the U.S. refreezing those funds. But critics argue that the fungibility of money means that Iran now has more financial firepower.

Analysts see the issue of Iranian funds – prominent in conservative media – as a way to stoke partisan fires even amid overall unity on Israel. 

“Republicans have identified this as an aspect of this issue where they feel they can score points against the president,” says Jordan Tama, a provost associate professor of international relations at American University and author of the book “Bipartisanship and US Foreign Policy.” “But then on the substance of the U.S. policy response to the crisis, there is actually a lot of bipartisanship.”

The Israel-Gaza war has also exposed fissures on the left, with some members of the Democrats’ left-wing faction known as “the Squad” declining to back the Biden administration’s call for support for Israel. But in the early going, the vast majority of Democrats have been wholly supportive of Israel.

The longer-term outlook for pro-Israel unity in the U.S. is likely to be more complicated, as Israel launches its counteroffensive in Gaza. Sen. Bernie Sanders, a progressive independent from Vermont, warned Wednesday that Israel’s cutting off food, electricity, fuel, and water to Gaza is a “serious violation of international law.”

“The problem of Gaza, the problem of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is an extremely complicated and difficult conflict, and it’s not given to simple solutions,” says Ned Lazarus, a visiting professor at George Washington University and expert on conflict resolution. “If it could be decided militarily in some kind of a simple way, I think that would have happened. But I don’t think it can.”

Another complicating element of the Israel-Gaza war is funding. The Biden administration has already sent additional military equipment to Israel but also wants Congress to approve supplemental funds. One tactic under consideration by the White House and some lawmakers is to put additional funding for Israel alongside new funding for U.S. border security, Taiwan, and Ukraine – with the last item a source of growing partisan tension.

Capitol Hill turmoil a boost to adversaries?

Then there’s Capitol Hill, where last week’s ouster of GOP Speaker Kevin McCarthy has left the House off-balance at a critical time for allies of both Israel and Ukraine. Though Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana was nominated by Republicans on Wednesday to be the next speaker, he has yet to be elected by the full House. There’s an urgent sense among Republicans that they need to settle the leadership question, and quickly.

“The attack on Israel has precipitated a global interest in America leading, and not leading from behind, leading from the front – strong, strong leadership, standing up for our allies, standing up for America’s interests,” says GOP Rep. Brian Babin of Texas, outside a meeting about whom to elect to replace Mr. McCarthy.

“It makes it more important that we get a speaker quickly,” he adds. “When America doesn’t lead, the world doesn’t do well.”

A bipartisan House resolution supporting Israel has nearly 400 co-sponsors but has yet to come to the floor. Until a new speaker is elected, most say the House cannot conduct business – though this is an unprecedented time, and Mr. McCarthy’s temporary replacement has said he’ll do what’s necessary to support Israel.

Lawmakers have said there is enough funding in the pipeline already to supply Israel’s immediate needs, including more Iron Dome interceptors that provide an aerial shield against Hamas missiles from Gaza. Tens of billions of dollars’ worth of Ukraine aid got postponed amid the frenetic efforts to avoid a government shutdown Oct. 1, and the removal of Speaker McCarthy days later has eaten up valuable time. Both allies will be looking for fresh aid in the weeks to come, particularly if the Israel-Gaza conflict grows into a broader regional conflict.

More broadly, some are concerned that a perception of U.S. government dysfunction has emboldened adversaries. Those include China, Russia, and now Iran, which reportedly gave Hamas the green light for its Oct. 7 attack five days earlier – though some reports from U.S. intelligence sources indicate Iranian leaders may have also been surprised by the attack. Oct. 2 was the same day that Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz moved to oust Mr. McCarthy. 

But Tennessee Rep. Tim Burchett, one of the eight Republicans who voted to remove Mr. McCarthy, dismissed the idea that Israel would be in any way hampered by internal House conflicts.

“What is Congress going to do, write Hamas a strong letter?” he asked, adding that the president is already doing what needs to be done, including sending the USS Gerald Ford to the eastern Mediterranean near Israel. “When they see that aircraft carrier, the largest aircraft carrier in the world, off the coast, I think that sends a pretty clear message of where America is.”

More than anything Congress can do, having Mr. Biden as president may be the strongest signal of all of U.S. support for Israel. His remarks Tuesday from the White House were noteworthy for their passion.

“Look, it’s visceral for him,” Mr. Makovsky of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy says. “There’s no Israeli leader who can say, ‘As I told Golda Meir 50 years ago,’” he adds, a reference to the president’s oft-told story of meeting the iconic Israeli prime minister when Mr. Biden was a newly minted U.S. senator.

“He self-identifies as a Zionist,” Mr. Makovsky says. “He says if there was no Israel, we’d have to invent one. He believes that after the Holocaust, the world owes the Jewish people a state. He’s had a lot of Jewish American support since the beginning of his career. It’s the real deal with him.”

Staff writer Sophie Hills contributed to this report.