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Don’t buy the hype: When President Joe Biden finally responds to the deadly Iran-backed attack on American troops in Jordan, odds are he’ll both dispel the concerns of fear-mongers hysterical he is going to bomb Iran and dash the dreams of saber-rattlers demanding that he do so.
That’s because for President Biden to strike Tehran’s tentacles, let alone the head of the octopus with the overwhelming force necessary to deter it – a la former President Trump’s strike on Iranian terror mastermind Qassem Soleimani – would be to completely contradict his entire Middle East policy.
In a continuation of the Obama-Biden administration policy before it, the president has subordinated nearly all else to making the mullocracy the regional “strong horse,” under the perverse premise that putting Iran First – and the screws to our Israeli friends and anti-Islamist Arab partners – will produce order and peace over instability and war.
Biden has sought since day one to both appease and empower the Islamic revolutionary regime and its proxies, emboldening them, and fueling and incentivizing ever-greater aggression.
His administration has refused to enforce sanctions on Iranian oil sales, flowing tens of billions of dollars into the regime’s coffers; provided still billions more in sanctions relief – including via the notorious $6 billion ransom payment made as part of a September 2023 hostage exchange; rescinded Trump-imposed UN “snapback” sanctions on its nuclear and weapons programs and let embargoes on Iranian missiles and long-range drones lapse; all while shrugging off Iran’s 80-plus attacks on our forces before October 7th, the bounties on the heads of Trump administration officials, and plots to assassinate dissidents on our soil.
These efforts spanned across and were critical to first a desperate attempt to reprise the Iran nuclear deal from which Trump had withdrawn, under which President Obama had financially bailed out the mullahs, legitimized their nuclear program, and put them on a glide path to a bomb. That attempt failed despite the best efforts of lead negotiator and alleged Iranian spy ringleader Rob Malley to make the deal even sweeter for Tehran in the way of sanctions relief and nuclear concessions than its predecessor.
Meanwhile, Iran rapidly advanced its nuclear program, yielding near-weapons grade enriched uranium. So, the Biden administration reportedly executed a shadow deal last year to bribe the mullahs into pausing the program.
As the regime recapitalized, and raced towards the bomb, its proxies intensified their jihadist activities – often following American efforts to appease them.
The Biden administration restored hundreds of millions of dollars in purported aid to the Palestinian Authority and UNRWA – funds Trump had cut – some of which flowed to Hamas-controlled Gaza. The money therefore underwrote the Iranian proxy’s Holocaust-level Oct. 7 attack. Despite Tehran’s extensive involvement in that attack, which the late Soleimani is said to have planned, the Biden administration has strained to de-link the regime from its proxy.
The Biden administration de-designated Iran’s Yemenite proxy, the Houthis, as a terrorist organization – after the outgoing Trump administration had so designated it. The Houthis, with Iranian weaponry, training, and direction have proceeded to turn the Red Sea into a virtual no-go zone. To save face, the White House recently resorted to a toothless partial re-designation of the jihadist group.
The Biden administration backed Lebanon’s Hezbollah-dominated military force, and took to mediating maritime and related deals advantageous to the Hezbollah-dominated state with Israel, while Hezbollah’s missile and rocket stock increased to an estimated 200,000. Since Oct. 7, the White House has labored to deter Israel from obliterating Hezbollah despite its provocations. Consequently, northern Israel has been rendered uninhabitable for up to 100,000 little-discussed refugees.
The shadow deal was supposed to put a halt to the proxy attacks. If so, Iran’s proxies have not honored it, instead staging more than 100 strikes on American troops in Iraq and Syria since mid-October.
To date, the U.S. has conducted responsive attacks – mostly pinprick strikes – at a rate of one for every 16.5 sustained.
Then came the Iran-backed Iraqi militia’s strike on the Tower 22 military outposts in Jordan, killing three American soldiers and wounding over three-dozen more.
Despite the outcry that dead Americans are a red line requiring the Biden administration to retaliate with real force, the administration’s response was telling.
Like after Oct. 7, it was at pains to create distance between Iran and its proxy. Iranian officials did the same.
Iran’s proxies have claimed their attacks are responsive to Israel’s defensive war.
Iran and its ally Qatar, Hamas’ other key state sponsor, have been demanding a ceasefire.
Biden administration officials reportedly harbor similar sentiments. Consistent with their desire from the start to thwart, micro-manage, scale down, and quickly end Israel’s incursion, they, alongside Qatar and Egypt, are pining to negotiate an extended pause to the fighting and withdrawal of the IDF from Gaza, an increase in aid that will resupply Hamas, and a transfer of Israeli hostages for an imprisoned Palestinian jihadist population many times larger.
The ceasefire could morph into an armistice, followed by a U.S. push for the creation of a Palestinian state – rewarding Hamas for its savagery.
The implication is that Iran is pushing an all-too-willing Biden to sue for a false peace.
We can make the pain of proxy attacks go away, the mullahs are saying, by forcing Israel – Iran’s chief rival – to effectively lose the war, and leaving it besieged and existentially threatened by what would amount to a genocidal Jew-hating Palestinian terror state, plus Hezbollah, all to Iran’s benefit.
Given the Biden administration’s treacherous agenda to date, ask yourself, is the president more likely to legitimately punish Iran, or take half-hearted cosmetic actions against its proxies while throwing the Jewish state to the wolves?
Also ask yourself this: How do any of the Biden administration’s actions serve America’s interest – let alone do justice to those who lost their lives at the hands of Iran in Israel and Jordan today, and across the world over the 45 years the mullocracy has reigned?
