jekyll & biden vs. Israel

BARACK Obama’s prescient warning about Joe Biden is so well-known it’s practically a cliche. “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to f--k things up,” the former president said of his vice president.

The remark, made as Biden closed in on the Democrats’ 2020 nomination, has served as a handy explanation for his otherwise inexplicable habit of seizing defeat from the jaws of victory.

The deadly, chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan and Biden’s decision to throw open the southern border without a plan for handling the millions of illegal crossers are just two of the many headscratching decisions that have turned his tenure into a synonym for failure.

A common thread is that his debacles were unforced errors. Doing nothing would have produced far better outcomes than the actions he took.

But the incumbent’s latest moves suggest a reconsideration is warranted. It is that Obama himself underestimated Biden’s ability to f--k things up.

The evidence is the president’s current and most outrageous folly, which has the potential to be consequential in the worst possible ways. This one could set the world on fire.

With his relentless criticism of Israel and now a threat to cut off munition supplies in the midst of a war, Biden is triggering a series of global repercussions. And all because he’s terrified of losing the election to Donald Trump.

There are three ways to evaluate Biden’s moves. Who do they hurt, who do they help and what is the payoff for his campaign?

Catastrophic timing

Israel, of course, suffers the most adverse consequences. Because it is locked in an existential conflict with Hamas, Biden has picked a terrible time to gut his pledge of “ironclad” support for the Jewish state.

Coming just days after he used a Holocaust Remembrance event to passionately link the Hamas attack of Oct. 7 to the horrors of Nazi Germany, Biden’s sudden military freeze smacks of a Jekylland-Hyde personality.

If the freeze stops Israel’s plan to eliminate Hamas, it will guarantee more Islamic terrorism and another war, which will mean more civilian casualties on both sides.

But Biden’s “f--k up” doesn’t end there. It also simultaneously undercuts America’s relationship with other allies who have new reason to worry they could be next on his hit list.

Can Saudi Arabia really trust an administration that mercilessly undercut America’s closest ally? Should European allies be worried that they, too, will somehow run afoul of a White House that treats its enemies better than its friends?

Then there’s Ukraine, which has another reason to worry, while Russia and China must be delighted to see American weakness in action.

Meanwhile, Hamas immediately benefits from the freeze. Biden’s previous efforts to force Israel to protect, feed and care for Gaza’s civilians already rewarded the Hamas strategy of using its fellow Arabs as human shields.

No military can simultaneously protect its own soldiers, fight an embedded force of terrorists and also care for the civilian population the enemy hides behind.

It is now clear the impossibility of Biden’s straitjacket was the whole point. By putting unreasonable demands on Israel and threatening to abandon it if it doesn’t comply, Biden hopes to end what is for Israel a war of self defense.

His monthslong campaign of criticism convinced the terrorist group time was on its side and played a role in its refusal to seriously negotiate the release of Israeli and American hostages in exchange for a cease-fire. And now Yahya Sinwar and other Hamas butchers are being rewarded again by Biden’s withholding of munitions for Israel’s push into Rafah, the group’s last stronghold.

Michael Oren, a former Israeli ambassador to the United States, told reporters that “by declaring open season on Israel,” Biden “created an American diplomatic Iron Dome for Hamas.”

Iran, too, benefits big time from the freeze. Flush with cash, thanks to Biden lifting oil sanctions and paying billions to ransom hostages, the murderous mullahs have effectively gotten a green light to continue their campaign of targeting Israel and trying to drive America out of the Mideast.

Tehran capitalizes

The first evidence of an emboldened Iran comes in the form of Hezbollah stepping up its rocket attacks from Lebanon, which led Israel’s defense minister to warn of a “hot summer” along his country’s northern border.

In addition, the Houthis renewed their attacks on international cargo ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, moves they wouldn’t make without Iran’s blessing.

Shamefully, Biden is apparently willing to accept the first two consequences of his betrayal of Israel if it brings him increased domestic support for his campaign. Distancing himself from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was aimed at winning over keffiyeh wearing, antisemitic college students and Muslim-American voters, especially in the Upper Midwest swing states.

So far, the gambit has been a bust. Mostly Democrats, these holdouts know their pressure is changing American policy, but they haven’t rewarded Biden with their support.

As The New York Times put it after surveying Muslim activists, the flip-flop on Israel amounts to “too little, too late.”

“The president’s announcement is extremely overdue and horribly insufficient,” Abbas Alawieh, an Arab American protest leader in Michigan, told the Times. “He needs to come out against this war. Period. That would be significant.”

It would indeed be significant — and tragic for Israel and America. Yet Biden presses on.

The one bit of good news is that his war strategy is finally alarming some Democrats, with dissenters correctly accusing the president of endangering Israel.

Twenty-six House Dems, led by New Jersey’s Josh Gottheimer, warned the White House that the weapons freeze aids the Iranian terror proxies’ “agenda of chaos, brutality, and hate, and makes a hostage agreement even harder to achieve.”

Some Dem megadonors are also unhappy, with Hollywood mogul Haim Saban getting to the bottom line in a note to campaign aides. “Let’s not forget there are more Jewish voters who care about Israel than Muslim voters who care about Hamas,” Saban wrote. “Bad, Bad, Bad decision on all levels,” he added, according to Axios.

All true, and plain-as-day obvious. Yet Biden remains unmoved by the evidence that he is playing with fire by appeasing America’s enemies and punishing its friends.

What a disaster.