Israeli anxiety, America and the ayatollahs

It’s safe to say that the entire world is watching and waiting with bated breath for the outcome.

By Ruthie Blum, JNS

Tensions are high in Israel as the United States enters the last lap of its presidential election.

Given the level of public concern surrounding the race and the amount of space devoted to it by local analysts, an alien observing from Mars might mistakenly assume that the vote is taking place between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, not across the Atlantic Ocean.

It’s already been established, through surveys and punditocracy consensus—including among those more predisposed politically to Vice President Kamala Harris and Democrats in general than to former President Donald Trump and the Republican Party—that most Israelis are praying for the latter to emerge victorious.

Polls showing that the candidates are basically tied, with daily fluctuations in swing-state percentages, is causing a lot of nail-biting, and not exclusively in U.S. capitals or Jerusalem.

No, it’s safe to say that the entire world is watching and waiting with bated breath for the outcome.

Though Joe Biden will remain at the helm in the White House until the beginning of 2025 regardless of the results at the ballot box, nobody thinks he’s running the show in any respect, nor has he been for at least two years.

It’s assumed in Israel, however, that the figures behind him could engage in serious lame-duck sabotage in the weeks leading up to the inauguration of his successor.

After all, during a similar period at the end of 2016, outgoing President Barack Obama and his sidekick, Secretary of State John Kerry, pulled a few stunts that made Israel’s enemies proud. Key among these moves was the abstention on U.N. Security Council Resolution 2334, adopted on Dec. 23.

Resolution 2334, which passed by 14-0, condemned Israeli settlements and called for all construction of them to cease.

It also called for further labeling of Israeli goods, not only those made in settlements. In addition, it categorized the Western Wall as “occupied Palestinian territory.”

Naturally, the resolution greatly pleased and was a boon to the BDS movement, Students for Justice in Palestine and other organizations hostile to the Jewish state.

The Palestinians lauded it in general and stated outright that it paved the way for divestment, sanctions and lawsuits at the International Criminal Court at The Hague.

Still, Kerry proceeded to suggest that Jews building apartments in Judea, Samaria and east Jerusalem prevent the Palestinians from being able to believe that Israel is acting in good faith, attributing the stalemate in peace talks to Israel’s “extremist” right-wing government (sound familiar?) rather than to the terror masters in Ramallah and Gaza.

Far more outrageous was his nod to the Palestinians’ mourning of the “Nakba,” the “catastrophe” of Israel’s establishment in 1948.

In other words, he acknowledged that the problem wasn’t the “occupation” of territories that Arab states lost in the 1967 Six-Day War, but the existence of Jews on any inch of the land, from the “river to the sea” and from Metula to Eilat.

Ahead of Kerry’s vile tirade, Trump tweeted: “We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect. They used to have a great friend in the U.S., but not anymore. The beginning of the end was the horrible Iran deal, and now this (U.N.)! Stay strong Israel, Jan. 20 [Trump’s inauguration in 2017] is fast approaching!”

Speaking of which, the Islamic Republic is hoping for Harris to end up in the Oval Office on this coming Jan. 20.

While spewing daily threats about dealing a severe retaliatory blow to Israel for its recent strikes on Iranian military sites—vowing to deploy more powerful warheads and missiles than it launched in its two previous attacks—the mullahs appear to be pausing for the upshot of the U.S. election.

They assume that Israel has a tacit agreement with the powers-that-be in Washington not to hit Iran before Tuesday.

But Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei must realize that such an arrangement would be null and void if Tehran were to take action.

Nevertheless, Hebrew news outlets have been obsessing over the question of when to expect the next assault that sends Israelis across the country into bomb shelters for more than the usual 20 minutes or so.

On one hand, the worry is genuine.

On the other, incessant discussion on the topic tends to have a lulling, almost numbing, effect.

Ironically, then, national anxiety surrounding America is higher at the moment than that related to the ayatollahs—though the two issues are indelibly interconnected.

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