President Joe Biden’s decision to deploy the THAAD advanced missile defense system to Israel, along with roughly 100 US service members, reinforces an undeniable reality: Israel is the country most likely to drag the US into another unnecessary war in the Middle East – and Biden is the president most likely to oblige Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war wishes.
After a year of Netanyahu repeatedly violating Biden’s ostensive red lines and acting in contradiction to the US president’s expressed wishes, there is little to suggest that Biden has seriously tried to stop Israel’s carnage in Gaza or sought to prevent Netanyahu from broadening the war. Rather, Biden’s strategy appears to have been to pace Israel’s escalations while softening its edges to avoid the inevitable international outcry and push back from becoming prohibitive. Biden is managing Israel’s war rather than ending it.
It is against this backdrop that Biden’s decision to deploy US troops and THAAD missiles in Israel is best understood. While Biden has claimed opposition to further escalation in the region, his strategy has been to solely pressure and deter the so-called “Axis of Resistance” – Iran, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Iraqi and Syrian militias, and Hamas – from taking escalatory steps while actively reducing the cost for Israel to widen the war.
Hellbound and Down 