Biden Uses Hamas Attack to Ask for $60 Billion for Ukraine
Biden is going to delay Israel aid in order to undermine Republicans
FRONTPAGE MAGAZINE
Daniel Greenfield
OCT 20, 2023
Cynical, but we knew this was coming. The Israel trip was a setup for the pitch that Biden delivered in his speech.
“American values are what make us a partner that other nations want to work with. To put all that at risk if we walk away from Ukraine, if we turn our backs on Israel. It’s just not worth it. That’s why tomorrow I’m going to send to Congress an urgent budget request to fund America’s national security needs, to support our critical partners, including Israel and Ukraine. It’s a smart investment that’s going to pay dividends for American security for generations.”
A source familiar with the supplemental request said it includes $60 billion for Ukraine and replenishing U.S. stockpiles, $14 billion for Israel, $10 billion for humanitarian efforts, $14 billion for the U.S. border with Mexico and $7 billion for the Indo-Pacific region. The White House has not yet released details.
Previous accounts had it at $10 billion for Israel. But the lion’s share is obviously going to the Ukraine war.
The mention of $10 billion for “humanitarian efforts” should also be raising red flags. What does that mean beyond the already $100 million promised for Gaza?
Biden had already foreshadowed that he would be using Israel to push for the Ukraine aid in his initial speech a week ago.
“My administration has consulted closely with Congress throughout this crisis. And when Congress returns, we’re going to ask them to take urgent action to fund the national security requirements of our critical partners.”
Partners. Plural.
The Pacific region indicates that some of the money will go to funding Taiwan’s defenses as well.
The border money won’t be used for security, but to more speedily process the illegal aliens invading the country for dispersion.
So it’s a mixed bag at best and Republicans are uncomfortable with the package deal.
Senator J.D. Vance co-wrote an op-ed accusing the administration of holding up Israel aid to get its Ukraine aid.
Having failed to force through more Ukraine funding by tying it to disaster relief for Americans, Senate leadership is now using the crisis in Israel as a “Plan B” to get the Biden administration’s funding request across the finish line — this time by as much as $100 billion.
But the conflicts in Ukraine and Israel are two distinct events that deserve two distinct responses…
Instead of holding up aid to Israel for additional Ukraine funding, Congress should give the situation in Israel the separate debate and vote that it deserves. Conservatives should also insist on securing our own borders and fully enforcing our immigration laws, considering that Hamas and other terrorist organizations have infiltrated our homeland through our open borders and continue to do so today.
J.D. Vance makes various arguments for why Ukraine and Israel are different. One that he doesn’t mention is that foreign aid to Israel has been used primarily to tether it to the U.S. defense industry as a means of control.
And that’s what we’re seeing now.
The annual foreign aid bill for Israel is basically a kind of spending credit in which Israel gets to buy U.S. weapons and systems, but in exchange for being dependent on us for resupply. That means the White House calls the shots on whether Israel goes to war and for how long. (This is a major function of our foreign arms sales and defense alliances.)
It’s like Hotel California. It looks like a good deal, but then when you need to rely on it, you realize it’s a leash.
The Biden administration wants a fight over the aid package because then it can accuse Republicans of betraying Israel and helping Hamas. Republicans will reply that Biden is the one sabotaging weapons supplies to Israel by tying it to $60 billion for Ukraine and things that may be more dubious like “humanitarian aid” potentially to terrorists.
Biden could have avoided it, but instead he’s going to use the Hamas attack for political leverage in a partisan fight. He’s going to delay Israel aid in order to undermine Republicans.
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Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.
https://www.frontpagemag.com/biden-uses-hamas-attack-to-ask-for-60-billion-for-ukraine/