Biden blasts Netanyahu as ‘a bad f-ing guy’ – report

The US president fears Israel’s leader is trying to drag America into a wider regional conflict, and could lose him the elections.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

U.S. President Joe Biden reportedly called Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “a bad f-ing guy” in private conversations due to his belief that Israel’s leader is trying to get the Americans involved in a wider Mideast conflict that could lose him the elections in November, Politico reported Sunday.

According to the news site, many Democratic lawmakers are angry at Netanyahu for what the war against Hamas is doing to their chances, and want the White House to pressure Israel into a permanent ceasefire.

“This is a disaster politically,” one House Democrat, described as being pro-Israel, told Politico. “The base is really pissed — and it’s not just the leftists. I have never seen such a depth of anguish as I’ve seen over this Gaza issue. Bibi is toxic among many Democratic voters and Biden must distance himself from him — yesterday.”

At a dinner in January with close to ten colleagues from his side of the aisle who, he stressed, did not all agree on ideological issues, this lawmaker referred to Netanyahu by his nickname and said, “It was unanimous that this Israel-Gaza war needed to end now and that Biden needed to stand up to Bibi.”

The critics seemingly dismiss how the president’s firm public commitment to Israel’s security has been tempered by growing pressure on Jerusalem from all visiting administration officials – and especially Biden himself, in calls with Netanyahu – to exponentially increase the flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza, as well as shift the war to pinpoint ground strikes with a much-downsized force.

Rhetoric acknowledging the pain of ordinary Gazans has also been on the rise.

“We have to look out for and respond to the immense and terrible suffering of the Palestinian people,” National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told ABC Sunday. “And that means pressing Israel on issues related to the humanitarian assistance that we have helped unlock and get into the Gaza Strip.”

“There has to be much more of it,” and the issue would be a “top priority” in Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s upcoming visit to Israel, he added.

Biden himself said at his National Prayer Breakfast Thursday that he would pray for those “held hostage or under bombardment or displaced,” equating all the victims of Hamas’ unprovoked October 7 invasion of Israel that sparked the ongoing war.

Most states in the Union have clear majorities of either Democrats (“blue”) or Republicans (“red”), and the outcome of a national vote usually comes down to the handful of so-called swing states. Michigan, with its large Arab-American population that is deeply angered over the American bias towards Israel when all they see on social media is Gazan suffering, is one of them.

Young voters are another population which poll after poll shows is much more evenly split in its sympathy towards the Palestinians than all the other age groups. If the many left-wingers among them go in large numbers for third-party candidates from such groups as the Greens or Libertarians as a protest vote, or stay home, many Democrats fear this could help tip the balance in several states as well.

“People don’t understand how few votes [the third-party candidates] would need to take away,” said Democratic operative Lis Smith. “It’s the whole election.”

Regarding the slur itself, Biden spokesperson Andrew Bates denied it outright, saying, “The president did not say that, nor would he,” adding that the two men have “a decades-long relationship that is respectful in public and in private.”

Benjamin NetanyahuDemocratsGaza humanitarian aidJoe BidenU.S. Elections 2024U.S.-Israel relations