Biden's Gaza Legacy Is Not Just Death and Destruction, But Lies, Lies, and More Lies
Here are seven of his worst, as we bid farewell to a president who will be remembered in the same way that we remember George W. Bush and Lyndon B. Johnson.
There are a plethora of much-discussed reasons as to why Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. will not be sworn in for a second term as president of the United States next week. His age and mental incompetence, for example; not to mention the catastrophic TV debate that exposed his mental incompetence to over 50 million viewers. There was the painful spike in inflation in 2022 from which he and his administration never fully recovered. And the online propaganda war waged against him by the world’s richest man. The sitting president was also one of multiple elected victims of a post-COVID anti-incumbency wave across the democratic world.
However, as we approach January 20 and his ignominious exit from the Oval Office, the Very Serious People in our mainstream media continue to ignore one key factor in Biden’s fall from grace: the US-backed slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza.
Yes, Biden’s complicity in the Gaza genocide cost him and his party tremendous support with key Democratic constituencies, from young voters, to Black pastors, to Muslim and Arab-American communities in swing states.
Don’t take my word for it. Here’s what Biden’s own ambassador to Israel, Jack Lew, said in his exit interview with the Times of Israel earlier this week: “Standing with Israel for these past 15 months, with huge opposition in the media, in parts of his own party, you could argue that it contributed to making his challenge for reelection insurmountable.”
Insurmountable. Think about that. The president of the United States, charged with protecting American democracy from the most far-right Republican presidential candidate of our lifetime, helped wreck his own chances for re-election by “standing with” the most far-right Israeli government in history.
But Biden didn’t just throw his unwavering support behind Benjamin Netanyahu and his hawkish coterie of fascists and racists. The US president also lied to the American public on behalf of the Israeli premier and his génocidaires. And he has done so, without any shame or compunction, over and over again since Oct. 7, 2023.
Here is a timeline of his seven worst Gaza lies:
1. ‘Beheaded Babies’
On Oct. 11, 2023, four days after the Hamas attacks inside of Israel, Biden lied when he said he had seen “confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children.” Biden could not have seen any such “confirmed” pictures as there were no children beheaded on Oct. 7. “A White House spokesperson later clarified that US officials and the president have not seen pictures or confirmed such reports independently,” the Washington Post reported. But it was too late: The alleged killer of 6-year-old Palestinian-American Wadea Al-Fayoume in Illinois “had become enraged due to coverage of the Israel-Hamas war, including claims that Israeli babies had been beheaded by Hamas fighters,” per the BBC.