A number of reasons explain the absolute bias of Biden and his administration towards Israel, which are:

Biden's personal passion for Zionism and Israel, and he keeps repeating a statement he made decades ago bragging about his Zionism, "You don't need to be a Jew to be a Zionist." He always repeats that "If there had been no Israel, we would have had to invent Israel." He reiterated these positions in his speech on the 10th of this month, which was the most closely aligned with Israel, and he absolutely adopted its position.

political calculations: The approaching presidential elections next year represents an opportunity for Biden and the Democrats to present themselves as strong supporters of Israel and its security, after years of tension with Netanyahu and his right-wing government, and Republicans exploiting this to accuse them of abandoning Israel, especially in light of the Biden administration’s efforts to revive the nuclear agreement with Iran. Opinion polls show a decline in Democratic support for Israel, specifically among the progressive wing of the party. Biden's relations with Netanyahu were marred by great tension, this year in particular, against the backdrop of the latter's government's insistence on passing a package of "judicial reform" laws, which caused a sharp Israeli division. Republicans claim that the prisoner exchange deal between Iran and the United States, last month (September), and the conditional release of six billion frozen dollars belonging to Iran, contributed to financing the Hamas operation, although Iran has not received it yet. 

The Biden administration also found itself in a position of defending its Middle East policy. 

Some experts held it responsible for what happened on October 7, and considered it evidence of the failure of its approach to the Middle East, which was based on expanding the Abrahamic Accords, initiated by the Donald Trump administration, for normalization between Arab countries and Israel, while ignoring the Palestinians. Critics here cite a statement by the US National Security Advisor, Jake Sullivan, on September 29, 2023, in which he praised the administration’s approach to the Middle East, saying: “The Middle East region is calmer today than it was two decades ago.” The existing assumption was that achieving some kind of peace between the Arabs and Israel would force the Palestinians to accept what Israel wants to impose on them, after they find themselves isolated under Arab-Israeli political and economic normalization, while events prove that the suffering of the Palestinians and their legitimate demands cannot be overlooked. With freedom, dignity and independence.

The close American-Israeli alliance relationship; The United States views Israel as an advanced base in the region, and it constitutes the cornerstone of its security approach in the Middle East. However, the security and military fragility that Israel appeared to exhibit on the morning of October 7 surprised Washington, shocked it, and shook its confidence in it. In this sense, direct American intervention aims to prevent a possible Israeli collapse if the conflict expands, and the resulting repercussions on American strategic calculations. Since the Biden administration came to the White House declaring that China was the primary “geopolitical challenge” to the United States, and to a lesser extent Russia, it sought to reduce American commitments in the Middle East. 

To achieve this, this administration attempted to build on the Trump administration’s approach to expanding the scope of Arab-Israeli normalization, especially at the level of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel, and to build a new regional security structure linked to it, and strengthened it with an economic component, represented by the economic corridor between India and the Middle East. And Europe, which was proposed on the sidelines of the G20 summit held in New Delhi, last month (September), to compete with China’s Belt and Road Initiative. In all of this, the Biden administration assumed that Israel would serve as a lever for its Arab allies to offset Iranian influence and capabilities in the region, but this seemed to be crumbling after the recent Hamas attack. This is what prompted the Biden administration to return to the region to enable Israel to restore its image of deterrence, which had suffered a major blow, and to prevent the opening of new fronts against it, which might cause a regional war that Israel may not be able to confront.

Conclusion

The military operation carried out by the Hamas movement and the approach adopted by the Biden administration in confronting it threaten to undermine the American strategy in the Middle East region. The Israeli collapse in the first hours of the operation and the increase in the American military presence in the region, with the aim of deterring Iran and its agents from opening a new front with Israel, if its aggression against Gaza continues, may drag the United States into a regional war that it does not want, as it wants to focus on China’s challenge to it. In addition, the absence of a clear American vision in the region and the tense situation there may destabilize some allied Arab countries, which fear popular protests, in addition to the concerns of Egypt and Jordan that Israel will push the Palestinians into new waves of asylum towards their borders. At the level of Biden’s electoral calculations, his absolute bias towards Israel in its brutal aggression against the Gaza Strip, although it may benefit him in terms of his relationship with the pro-Israel lobby in the United States, may cost him dearly in terms of the support of the progressive movement for him and the youth base in the Democratic Party, as well as votes. Arabs and Muslims are in favorable states, such as Michigan, Virginia, Georgia, and Arizona, and from here, his calculations may turn against him. The position of Biden and his administration, which is excessively biased towards Israel and their disregard for the suffering of the Palestinians, has resulted in resignations and widespread dissatisfaction in the State Department, and this dissatisfaction has expanded to include employees and members of Congress, specifically from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, as well as divisions in society, in universities, and even in American technology companies, and its repercussions have reached Hollywood.

Source: Arab 48