Examining the record of the Biden administration thus far, Michael Pompeo and Elan Carr notice a pattern of decisions deleterious to the Jewish state. These policies, they argue, are the result of pressure from the left flank of the president’s own party:

The trouble began only three weeks after Inauguration Day, when the administration announced plans to rejoin the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC). The Council has made Israel-bashing a primary focus, racking up over 100 condemnations of that one country in seventeen years—roughly the same number as for all other countries combined. Had the administration found this disturbing and in need of repair, it could have negotiated conditions for our return. For example, it might have demanded that “item 7,” which mandates a discussion of Israel at every session, be stricken from UNHRC meeting agendas. No such conditions were levied.

In March 2023, President Biden publicly snubbed Benjamin Netanyahu, newly returned to office, and announced that the prime minister would not be receiving an invitation to Washington “in the near term.” The reason given for this rare insult of a close ally is the Netanyahu government’s controversial reforms to Israel’s judicial system. But this explanation was itself an insult, given that the snub came the day after Prime Minister Netanyahu announced the temporary suspension of the legislation.

All of these painful examples pale in comparison with the most dangerous Biden policy affecting Israel, which is his tilt toward the rogue regime in Iran. The Islamic Republic is the world’s chief state sponsor of both terrorism and anti-Semitism, and for years it has been bent on developing nuclear weapons and delivery capabilities that present an existential threat to Israel and our Gulf allies.

The Biden administration has bent over backward to resurrect some new version of the Obama-era [nuclear deal]. . . . As unwise as we believe this to be, the greater outrage is that the Biden team has been rewarding Iran all this time without having concluded any agreement, formal or informal. The administration has been reversing the “maximum pressure” sanctions campaign we had helped to impose during the previous administration—and has received nothing in return.

Yohanan Tzoreff, writing yesterday, believes that Hamas still wishes to return to the truce that it ended Friday morning with renewed rocket attacks on Israel, but hopes it can do so on better terms—raising the price, so to speak, of each hostage released. Examining recent statements from the terrorist group’s leaders, he tries to make sense of what it is thinking:

These [Hamas] senior officials do not reflect any awareness of the changed attitude in Israel toward Hamas following the October 7 massacre carried out by the organization in the western Negev communities. They continue to estimate that as before, Israel will be willing to pay high prices for its people and that time is working in their favor. In their opinion, Israel’s interest in the release of its people, the pressure of the hostages’ families, and the public’s broad support for these families will ultimately be decisive in favor of a deal that will meet the new conditions set by Hamas.

In other words, the culture of summud (steadfastness), still guides Hamas. Its [rhetoric] does not show at all that it has internalized or recognized the change in the attitude of the Israeli public toward it—which makes it clear that Israel still has a lot of work to do.