Biden embraces Schumer’s speech in which he criticizes Netanyahu

President Biden on Friday praised Senator Chuck Schumer’s speech in which he took a swipe at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, calling it “a good speech” that raised concerns “shared not only by him but by many Americans.”

While Mr. Biden did not explicitly endorse the specific criticisms in the speech, or Mr. Schumer’s call for elections to replace Mr. Netanyahu, the president’s comments were the latest step in his escalating public criticism of the Israeli prime minister.

Privately, the two have clashed in a series of phone calls — the last of which was a month ago — but Mr. Biden has been reluctant to publicly part ways with Mr. Netanyahu.

In an interview on Friday, Mr. Schumer said he gave the speech because “I thought it was important to show that even if you strongly disagree with Netanyahu, you can still be a strong ally of Israel.”

There is no indication that the White House was in any way involved in the planning of the speech.

But sometimes in Washington, the most telling indicator is not a public statement, but its absence. Mr. Biden could have asked Mr. Schumer to restrain himself so as not to jeopardize the president’s future ability to deal with Mr. Netanyahu, with whom he now barely speaks. He could have said that the United States should not express an opinion about the inner workings of Israel’s democratic processes. He didn’t.

Lawmakers and aides who have spoken with Mr. Biden in recent weeks say his anger at Mr. Netanyahu is now eating away at his reluctance to make his criticisms public. He is angry that Mr Netanyahu has publicly rejected the government’s push to limit the bombing campaigns that have killed some 30,000 people in Gaza, allow much more aid and plan for a post-war future that does not involve Israel running the territory .

Last week, Mr. Biden was heard telling a congressman that he and Mr. Netanyahu should have a “come to Jesus” meeting.

Mr. Biden said that Mr. Schumer, Democrat of New York and Senate Majority Leader, had briefed his White House staff before the speech in which the senator denounced Mr. Netanyahu’s leadership in the war against Hamas and concluded that the prime minister risked causing trouble for Israel. a global pariah.

“I’m not going to comment on the speech,” Biden said in response to a reporter’s question as he received the Irish prime minister at the White House. “He gave a good speech and I think he expressed a serious concern that was shared not only by him but by many Americans.”

The day before Mr. Schumer stood in the Senate pit and delivered his remarks, he called Jake Sullivan, Mr. Biden’s national security adviser, and Jeffrey D. Zients, the White House chief of staff, according to people familiar with the conversation. . He asked Mr. Sullivan whether giving the speech could jeopardize hostage release negotiations and was told there was no problem. Mr Zients made no political objections.

Mr. Biden has staunchly supported Israel’s right to defend itself and respond to Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist attack that killed 1,200 people. The president has also rejected calls from within his own party to cut off the flow of weapons or impose conditions on their use.

But Mr. Biden has become increasingly critical of Mr. Netanyahu’s government for its war-making. In his State of the Union address last week, Mr. Biden said that “Israel must allow more aid into Gaza and ensure that humanitarian workers are not caught in the crossfire” and that “protecting and saving innocent lives is a priority must be. ”

Over the weekend, Mr. Biden hinted — but stopped short of saying — that he might impose some restrictions on weapons supplied to Israel if his warnings are ignored. “It’s a red line, but I will never leave Israel,” he said, saying defensive weapons like the Iron Dome, which intercepts incoming missiles, would never be compromised.

But that left open whether he would set limits on how Israel would use 1,000- and 2,000-pound bombs against targets in Gaza, where massive explosions in an urban environment cause widespread casualties. Mr. Sullivan sidestepped questions about the president’s thinking this week, saying that “we are not going to engage in hypotheticals about what will ultimately happen, and that reports purporting to describe the president’s thinking are uninformed speculation .”

Mr. Schumer also stopped short of advocating limits on weapons sent to Israel. But some of his Democratic colleagues, led by Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, are openly calling for it. A dozen senators have said they are working on an amendment that would require weapons received by any country to be used “in accordance with United States law,” which includes provisions limiting attacks that could cause collateral damage to civilians .

Yet Schumer’s speech on Thursday went further than any senior US official has gone in castigating Netanyahu.

The Prime Minister has “lost his way in allowing his political survival to take precedence over Israel’s interests” and “has been too willing to tolerate the toll on civilians in Gaza, which has driven global support for Israel to an all-time low.” pushes’. Schumer said.

He went on to say that he believed that “new elections are the only way to enable a healthy and open decision-making process about Israel’s future.” Those elections, he added, should take place “as soon as the war begins to wind down” and “give Israelis the opportunity to express their vision of the post-war future.”

“Of course, the United States cannot dictate the outcome of an election,” Mr. Schumer continued, “nor should we try to do so. That is for the Israeli public to decide – a public that I believe understands better than anyone that Israel cannot hope to succeed as a pariah against which the rest of the world opposes.”

The speech caused a furor in Israel, especially on the part of Mr. Schumer, a longtime Jewish supporter of the Jewish state and a close ally of Mr. Biden.

After Mr. Biden spoke on Friday, a White House spokesman emphasized that the president was not specifically calling for a new election. “That is for the Israeli people to decide,” said the spokesman, John F. Kirby.

Critics in the United States and Israel have complained that Mr. Schumer’s comments amounted to an inappropriate foreign intervention in the internal democratic politics of an ally, an intervention that was particularly egregious at a time of war when Israel was fighting an enemy his destruction was over. In the past, however, Mr. Biden’s aides have noted Mr. Netanyahu’s willingness to insert himself into the American political process, particularly when he appeared before Congress to oppose passage of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal .

Mr. Biden offered his thoughts on Mr. Schumer’s speech during a meeting in the Oval Office with Prime Minister Leo Varadkar of Ireland, himself an outspoken critic of Israel’s handling of the war. Mr Varadkar made good on his promise to raise the issue with Mr Biden at the annual meeting at the White House to mark St Patrick’s Day.

“I also want to continue talking about the situation in Gaza,” Mr Varadkar told Mr Biden. “You know my opinion that we need a ceasefire as soon as possible to get food and medicine in and to get hostages out. And we need to talk about how we can make that happen and move toward a two-state solution, which I believe is the only way we can achieve lasting peace and security.”

Biden nodded. “I agree,” he said softly.

Still, Mr. Varadkar left the meeting realizing that whatever his own concerns about Mr. Netanyahu’s military operations, Mr. Biden had no intention of cutting off the flow of American munitions and air defenses to Israel.

“The president has been very clear that the US will continue to support Israel and help Israel defend itself, so I don’t think that will change,” Mr Varadkar told reporters outside the White House after the meeting. “But I don’t think any of us like to see American weapons being used the way they are being used. The way they are currently used is not self-defense.