JPOST
Biden abandoned hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin
Moshe Phillips
September 5, 2024

It’s appalling that US President Joe Biden is blaming Israel for Hamas’s recent murder of six hostages, including American citizen Hersh Goldberg-Polin. But what makes Biden’s stance even more outrageous is the fact that his administration has never taken even the most minimal steps to bring about the release of any of the Americans who were kidnapped by Hamas. What could Biden have done?…The US has been pouring aid into Gaza—$674 million between October 7 and mid-July 2024. Much of that was stolen by Hamas and used to sustain its forces, including the kidnappers who are holding Americans captive. Biden could have announced that no aid would enter Gaza until the American citizens were released. READ MORE

COMMENTARY John Podhoretz: The Hostage Murders and the New Threat…And I cannot help but ask. I cannot. Had the Biden administration’s will not been bent and twisted in the months following the attack by the fiendish propaganda campaign causing them to worry about the war’s effect on Joe’s chances in Michigan—due to a population that effectively supported the terrorist monsters and cared not a whit for the eight Americans, let alone the 240 other innocents dragged into Hell—would Hersh and these others have survived? Imagine an Israel that had not found itself restrained and under assault, not told to pause, not scolded in pissy little phone calls with petulant American establishmentarians, without arms and aid held up, without being lectured about the geo-strategic value of going slow or not going at all. READ MORE

JNS Jonathan Tobin: Don’t confuse Washington’s Netanyahu-bashing with those of Israeli critics Most Israelis understand that had Biden stuck to his initial position of strong support, the defeat of Hamas would have been made possible and accomplished faster, and at the cost of fewer lives on both sides. And they also realize that pressuring Netanyahu—and not Hamas and its enablers in Qatar and elsewhere—is part of the problem. By pursuing its vendetta against Netanyahu rather than supporting Israel, the administration has undermined U.S. interests in the region and given aid and comfort to the terrorists. Rather than supporting Israelis or the hostages, Biden and Harris are sticking to Obama’s failed formula for the Middle East that has already cost so many lives in Israel, Gaza, Lebanon and Yemen.