This Is the Story of How the Democrats Blew It on Gaza - Ben Rhodes

[cliffside]

Full article/gift link

By Ben Rhodes

Mr. Rhodes is a contributing Opinion writer. He was a deputy national security adviser under President Barack Obama.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/01/opinion/democrats-israel.html?unlocked_article_code=1.7E8.xA3B.S4NEju6LRINu&smid=url-share

"Less than two weeks after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, President Joe Biden traveled to Israel and held Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in an embrace. The image captured the solidarity Americans felt with Israelis after they suffered such horrific violence. It also symbolized a political and governing reflex within the Democratic Party.

During the Biden presidency, it was short-handed the “hug Bibi” strategy — the idea that smothering Mr. Netanyahu with unconditional support would give the U.S. leverage to influence his actions. Over the final 15 months of the Biden presidency, this approach led the White House to provide a flood of weapons for Israel’s bombardment of Palestinians, veto United Nations Security Council resolutions calling for a cease-fire, attack the International Criminal Court for pursuing charges against Mr. Netanyahu, ignore its own policies about supporting military units credibly accused of war crimes and blame Hamas for not accepting cease-fire terms that the Israeli government was also rejecting.

This approach made Democrats hypocrites when defending a “rules-based order,” racial equality and democracy. It alienated elements of their base and placed them out of step with younger voters. And in an age of authoritarianism, fealty to an Israeli strongman who routinely humiliated them made Democrats appear weak: Mr. Netanyahu was hugged all the way into the arms of Donald Trump.

Today, with a tenuous cease-fire, it may be tempting for the party to memory hole what has happened in Gaza. After all, Democrats just won some resounding electoral victories focused on affordability, and there is no easy consensus on the Middle East. Yet this would compound the mistake of ignoring, or rationalizing, an intolerable reality....."

[H2O Man]

1. Recommended.

I can remember some people saying rude things about students protesting the war on Gaza. It turns out they were right, just as my generation was on Vietnam.

[Boo1]

6. They were in the wrong

and they were never just "protesting the war on Gaza."

[H2O Man]

16. Way wrong.

[H2O Man]

32. Sure you are.

Note that you reference the NY Post.

[cliffside]

7. Thank you! We were right on Vietnam, my Dad served in WW2 and when there was a draft way back when ...

my Dad told my male cousins he would help them to go to Canada if they wanted. I learned that way later from my male cousins after my Dad passed.

War is a racket according to some... thinking Smedley Butler. During my life I've seen this with Iraq, oil reserves, now with Venezuela possibly/most likely oil and other countries with rare earth minerals ... "national interests? Every time I hear that phrase I want someone to ask the question ... what are our national interests?' I spent two summers and one Christmas holiday in Caracas with my best friend in HS, late 60's early 70's. We need to rethink our values and compassion for others who have less than we do, travel is an underrated education. My parents took out a loan from Beneficial Finance at a high rate to buy my ticket when I was invited by my friend.

Appreciate the rec from an old timer.

[H2O Man]

17. After coming here

in the 1800s, my paternal side had guys serve in the Civil War, WW1, WW2, and Korea. So during the draft era, my father insisted me brother would serve if called. They had some heated debates, which upset my father enough that he told his supervisor at work. A few evenings later, the supervisor brought his son who was on leave to tell Dad the truth about the war. After that, Dad said he would help my brother make it into Canada if drafted.

People should see that jackals like Jared are trying to "stop" wars based entirely on access to resources and self-interest. As Elders, it is our duty to try our best to teach the younger generation these lessons we have learned. Too often -- in my opinion -- the internet serves to cut people off from history. Yet the potential good is there for us, if we have open and frank talks about issues. If I look back seven generations, my grandfather taught in hedge schools along the dirt roads, which was "illegal" at the time. We can do the same with the information highway.

[cliffside]

25. Thanks ....more tomorrow :) nt

[LexVegas]

2. Well, the blame Democrats wing certainly "won". nt

[cliffside]

8. It is not about blaming Dems. nt

[tritsofme]

3. One of the best things Biden did as president was to never hire Ben Rhodes.

[usonian]

4. There was a massive and successful "split the Democrats" campaign.

Assisted enormously by bots on social media. I'll give you exactly one guess where they originated.

[cliffside]

9. Not needing a bot to know what what is right or wrong, bombing refugee camps, supplying weapons is not right

the Dems should have called this out more forcefully ... few did.

[usonian]

24. I believe that Kamala, more than the progressives, was a moderating influence on Biden

and obviously would have done infinitely more than Jabba the Orange Hutt to help victims of the hostilities.

That was not conveyed. I have posted for Dems to lead with their strength, and that happens to be economic issues , the ones that progressives are hammering. They are not ignoring social issues. They come up after the main theme in rallies.

Focus is crucial to stave off the damn "whatabouts".

I have maintained that Israeli's are betrayed by Bibi and that Gazans are betrayed by Hamas. Good luck trying to make anything better "cuz you're supposed to take one side over the other" and not humanity.

IMO Bibi and his cadre need to spend life in prison and same for Hamas. And that's just to stop the killing. Fat chance.

But the past is to learn from and people don't.

I argued that Harris would have been infinitely better for Gazans. But in CA it didn't really matter. It mattered a lot elsewhere. And I'll agree that the message was weak. I can only control myself.

Would a stronger message have made the difference? Maybe so, but it had really loud, energetic and powerful distractors.

Times have changed. Let's focus and make winning choices. Not to bury other important issues, but to focus on the big winners.

The others will then succeed.

[leftstreet]

5. DURec

[cliffside]

10. Thank you :) nt

[mountain grammy]

11. Excellent article. Thank you for gifting the whole thing.

He is not wrong.

[cliffside]

13. You're welcome and it my pleasure, I'm thinking we need another DU forum to share articles ...

so we do not duplicate/waste the number of shares per month, posts in GD get lost too often.

Agree, he is not wrong .

[cliffside]

15. Maybe we should reflect on what others have suffered because of our policies and not just what this asshole has

unleashed upon citizens of the US and immigrate families. That leads us nowhere IMHO.

This might not be popular but it is not all about "us" it also relates to our status in the world and we are failing, one could look at the debt to GDP ratio, how much money is being funneled to both parties etc. ...but I digress.

Yes the Dems are better but I'm not going to shy away from criticism where it is due, we are supplying weapons.

I put the Gaza Strip weather on my iPhone months ago, they had rains and the current the temp is low 50's and most living in tents, flooding, and still watching for bombs. J

Just think about this, aside from food insecurity, kids not attending school, lack of access to medical care, kids without a limb, people with cancer, people needing dialysis etc etc.

Some people/voters care about what we do to others with our tax dollars that support the lives of others.

A bit tired of the "Genocide Joe" and "Killer Kamala" being used as an excuse for our policies overseas that harm others.

[cliffside]

22. Not sure you understand what our policy was, and ALL CAPS does not elevate your position, we helped to kill ...

maim, displace tens of thousands of innocent people and destroyed their homes .... that is what happened to people in the Gaza Strip, not to mention the West Bank settlements which is ongoing.

Yes some were terrorists, many/most were not.

If we are to have more reasonable people in power we should reflect on mistakes make in the past instead of dismissing concerns of the voting public ... if we do not do that we're lost.

You only get to MAKE POLICY if you have the voting public on your side ... we did not in 2024.

Stop blaming others and look in the mirror as the saying goes.

[H2O Man]

19. There are those

who are incapable of a meaningful discussion on this without resorting to "you're blaming the Democrats!" when they blamed those who did not vote for VP Harris, or clinging to a weak "we'd rather legislate" nonsense. Now, I campaigned and voted for the ticket. But it seems some are blind to the fact that voters of a certain generations lost family and friends while serving in Dick Cheney's attack on Iraq ...... so bringing that shriveled Dick on stage to endorse our ticket was a worse error than naming Thomas Eagleton as VP was in 1972. Supporting Netanyahu's gross violence is not going to convince people to vote for our party.

[cliffside]

23. We need to have these discussions amongst ourselves, if we cannot then how can we possibly have a discussion with ...

others in our neighborhood/community.

Fortunately I do not know anyone who died during the Iraq invasion ... for resources/national interests/oil but I do remember reading that over 30 percent of their population was displaced, probably more and not sure how many were killed.

Not sure if anyone here remembers someone that was posting and relayed here, supposedly a younger woman from Bagdad, who once said ...today is better than tomorrow. That line always stuck with me.

Nobody is perfect, nor is any country, it has been that way for centuries and unfortunately only getting worse as we now fight for rare earth minerals and now water in some parts of the world. Iran is considering moving their capitol from Tehran because there is not enough water, pictures show large fountains are now dry. Mother Nature always has the last word.

We, as a party, can and should do better and one of the first items should be money out of politics. If we cannot do that then both parties will continue to be compromised.

Wake up everybody as that old, great song, goes.

[paulkienitz]

14. Biden did a lot right. This was his biggest failure.

[jfz9580m]

21. This was definitely his biggest failure

He was less friendly to some of the neoliberalism of the Obama era (bringing in the awesome Lina Khan and somewhat more labor or environment friendly policies…the environment has just gone out of the debate by now…I guess Earth has been told it needs to fuck off) than our sleazy elite liked.
I myself got destroyed by the neoliberalism of that era.

And there was definitely a super sleazy MAHA type faction exploiting this horrifying war for Trumpian ends. This creep is an example:

https://roadtoomega.substack.com/p/the-case-for-progressive-party-reform

He claims to be “progressive” but elsewhere talks about bringing in a “purer” form of capitalism.

Reminds me of Justine Tunney, the crazy who was in the Occupy Wall Street movement and then went on to say that Obama should resign and Eric Schmidt be made CEO of the US.

I can’t tell with people like these if they are just kinda insane or plants. But either way, they are not the left. I don’t know what they are beyond malicious and self serving mostly.

I agree about the horrors of Gaza. Good god, what humane person wouldn’t. But the horrible reality of US politics is that the GOP is reliably
always garbage along with the industrialists (who are just opportunists, whatever their sartorial choices). Which makes every election a kind of escalating hostage situation. Sad that language that hyperbolic isn’t even that off. Well okay maybe not quite that. But my point is, I wasn’t slamming the op or denying the horrors of Gaza. I just hope a canny neoliberal doesn’t try to use it to attack Biden era antitrust policy etc. As I said, I have been personally affected and so I am as wary of neoliberals as of war hawks. Warier in truth because when you are dealing with your own troubles they tend to take centre stage.
The Lew Rockwell types are anti war but they are also anti regulation and pretty much everything sane. It’s not single issue.

And these guys are good at using language and messaging confusingly. They try to spin things in the least common sense driven ways possible.

There are no easy fixes or solutions. But definitely a neoliberal who is “anti-war” wouldn’t help. It’s like they try syncretic mixes to figure out how to swindle the populace and destroy the planet best.

[paulkienitz]

29. "they try syncretic mixes to figure out how to swindle the populace and destroy the planet best" -- Yup.

[Uncle Joe]

20. An excellent article

Thanks for the thread cliffside

[cliffside]

26. My pleasure, think we need a sharing forum to pool resources for paid sites ...

and thank you for posting many threads that I read

[Xolodno]

27. When Putin got indicted by ICC, Biden practically did a jig.

When Bibi got indicted, he flew off the handle.

That's not a good look.

Plus we should only offered humanitarian aid, Israel can fight off most of Middle East (and has nukes). Military aid was one step too far given how much we give them already. And it was well known Bibi turned a blind eye to Hamas because it inserted a wedge with the PA. So he bares significant responsibility.

This mistake, cost Biden and then Harris. Obama was wary of Bibi and for good reason, Biden took a more "traditional" approach under a foreign policy that is no longer relevant and should be tossed to the gutter.

[Raven123]

28. Very thoughtful piece. Thanks for posting

[W_HAMILTON]

30. The same people that got dragged around by the nose by the social media propaganda surrounding this issue...

...would have been dragged around by the nose by some other social media propaganda had it not been this issue.

The vast majority of these people were bitching and moaning about the Biden administration well before Gaza even became an issue. If it wasn't Gaza, it would have been """only""" $10k in student loan debt relief, not legalizing marijuana (instead of just decriminalizing it), etc.

These people are not reliable allies and we cannot count on them as reliable voters because they are too easily deluded by social media propaganda. We should not dictate what we do or do not do based on catering to them because no matter what we do, they will find a way to bitch and moan and refuse to vote for us anyway.

[IbogaProject]

33. Those protests lost funding right after the election in 2024

I am reffering to how the money for the Gaza protests ended right around the election in 2024. I knew it was a con-intel-pro type of political operation. And I felt immediately after Oct 7, I was suspicious that T's son in law had some involvement with that assault. Bibi conviently moved their armed troops up to the eest bank to help settlers steal land and only left unarmed women idf at a monitoring station. And that festival got moved there at the last minute. I am going to dig up a Times of Israel that detailed some of Netanyahu's actions enabling that disaster. He also has been propping Hamas up to divide Gaza from the West Bank politically

[IbogaProject]

34. Here is my post from 10/08/23

Bibi created this mess and worked with Hamas to divide the Palestinian peoples
Oct 2023
Netanyahu’s policy of treating the terror group as a partner, at the expense of Abbas and Palestinian statehood, has resulted in wounds that will take Israel years to heal from

https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up-hamas-now-its-blown-up-in-our-faces/

So yet another example of a corrupt right wing criminal making the world worse for all.

[cliffside]

35. Thanks for that article! nt