US President Joe Biden has an interesting story that he himself tells; He said that he had turned the page on politics and was happy to retire from public life, but all that soon changed after Donald Trump’s “suspicious” reaction to the white supremacist march in 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Then, says American writer Peter Beinart, Biden realized that Trump and his allies threatened what he called “the spirit of this nation” derived from its commitment to establishing equality among the people, so Biden decided to return to the political arena again.
According to Beinart in an article published by the New York Times, Biden has been arguing that defending equality is the key to preserving American democracy at home and enhancing his country’s influence abroad. Therefore, he began the video in which he announced his candidacy for the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries, noting that Charlottesville was the home of Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States and one of its founding fathers, and the author of the phrase, “All men are created equal.”
“A beacon to the world”
In his presidential nomination acceptance speech at the 2020 Democratic National Convention, Biden claimed – according to Beinart – that America’s “great goal” was to “return to be a light to the world again,” and to live up to and ultimately abide by the terms contained in the founding Constitution. The state states that “all men and women are created equal.”
Beinart – who works as a professor of journalism at the City University of New York and editor of the magazine Jewish Currents – pointed out that Biden pledged, in his inauguration speech in 2020, to once again make the United States a “beacon to the world,” setting a framework for a commitment to equality as a response. Not only on the rise of white nationalism at home, but also on the authoritarian forces that threaten democracy abroad.
However, the author of the article believes that Biden’s presentation of himself in this way is now in vain, as through his steadfast support for Israel, he continues to stand by its “unjust” treatment and oppression of the Palestinians, especially in the Gaza Strip, and thus undermines the rationale for his presidency.
Blatant racism
The writer stated that the Israeli political system is explicitly based on religion and ethnicity. The controversial 2018 “Nation-State” bill states that only Jews can “exercise the right of national self-determination.” Therefore, most Palestinians under Israeli control who live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip cannot become citizens of the state that dominates their lives.
Although a minority of Palestinians living within Israel’s 1967 borders enjoy citizenship and the right to vote, when Israeli Arab politicians introduced a bill that would have made legal equality between Arab and Jewish citizens the basis of Israeli law in 2018, the Speaker of the Israeli Parliament refused to allow the vote. Because it “will erode the foundations of the state.”
The writer criticized the contradiction in the US President’s positions, saying that he does not support the equality stipulated by the law when it comes to Israel.
A gap between ideals and actions
He said that the current war in Gaza made it impossible to ignore this contradiction. He added that this is blatantly evident when Biden expresses his deep sympathy for Israeli suffering but is relatively indifferent to the much larger number of Palestinian deaths, or when his administration appears to discriminate even among American citizens, as he shows more interest in those killed by the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas). Of his interest in those killed by the Israeli army.
It is no wonder, then – says the writer – that an opinion poll conducted by the Institute of World Affairs last September showed that Democrats consider Biden’s policy towards Gaza to be the biggest failure in his foreign policy.
Young Americans, in particular, are alienated by the gap between Biden’s actions and his stated ideals. A poll conducted by the Harvard Institute of Politics in March found that more than three-quarters of Americans under the age of 30 disapproved of his policy regarding the Israeli war on Gaza.
Beinart believes that Biden, with his almost unconditional support for Israel’s actions, has damaged his reputation abroad as well. He has long claimed that the United States, unlike Russia and China, defends a “rules-based” order to which all countries, regardless of their power, adhere to certain standards.