July 12: Biden Lives, for Now

Age or issues?; Hostage negotiation updates; Iran: "We did Oct. 7!"

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The Big Story

In a news conference Thursday night, President Biden vowed to stay in the race unless polls showed he had “no chance” of defeating Trump—a possibility he then immediately dismissed. “I think I’m the most qualified person to run for president,” Biden said. “I beat [Trump] once, and I’ll beat him again.” 

The press conference was full of minor gaffes, including Biden referring to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “President Putin” and to Vice President Kamala Harris as “Vice President Trump.” But the performance was good enough to rally his camp and significantly better than in the debate two weeks ago—meaning it was a disappointment to Democrats hoping for another disaster that would have delivered the coup de grâce. As Republican strategist David Polyansky told The New York Times, the Democrats now find themselves “stuck in the mud,” with a candidate who is “no longer capable of winning reelection” but “apparently not bad enough for Democratic power brokers to move him out.” 

Biden’s better-than-expected performance, however, has not stemmed the tide of defections. Three more House Democrats called on Biden to withdraw immediately following the press conference, including the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Jim Himes (D-CT). And on Friday, key Biden ally Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC), who helped the president lock down the Democratic nomination in 2020, hinted that he was open to Biden stepping down. “Let Joe Biden continue to make his own decisions about his future. He’s earned that right,” Clyburn told NBC’s The Today Show. “If he decides to change his mind later on, then we will respond to that. We have until the 19th of August to open our convention.” 

Meanwhile, Barack Obama’s growing skepticism about Biden’s ability to win is the “worst-kept secret in Washington,” according to a Thursday-night report from CNN. Sources who have spoken to the former president claim that he’s been “fielding more calls than he’s making” and “carefully avoiding taking positions that he assumes would quickly leak.” But, the report hints, “when the history of this extraordinary two-week period of American politics is written, the fingerprints of Obama and [former Speaker of the House Nancy] Pelosi will be far more apparent than currently known.” Tantalizing!

Whether it’s Obama’s doing or not, the Democratic donor class appears to be in full-blown panic. The New York Times reported Friday that major donors have told Biden’s largest super PAC, Future Forward, “that pledges worth roughly $90 million are now on hold if Biden remains atop the ticket.” And the Times reported yesterday that the Biden campaign was quietly polling Kamala Harris’ strength in a head-to-head matchup with Donald Trump, though Biden shot down questions about this polling at his press conference. 

Fox Business correspondent Charles Gasparino, however, suggests we should believe Biden when he says he’s staying in the race:

As if to illustrate Gasparino’s point, Axios’ Alex Thompson and Hans Nichols reported late Friday that Biden’s staff worry that the “president is surrounded by a shrinking group of ‘yes’ men and women who block negative information from getting to him.” According to one “person familiar with the West Wing power structure,” the White House is being run by “the family and staff who are effectively family,” such as longtime Biden advisors Mike Donilon, Steve Ricchetti, and Bruce Reed, and Jill Biden aides such as Annie Tomasini and Anthony Bernal, the latter of whom now acts as an internal “loyalty police.”

IN THE BACK PAGES: The Tablet audience editors interview four members of the IDF’s elite Egoz unit about what it’s like to fight in Gaza

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The Rest

→But remember, it was only a few weeks ago that concerns about the president’s mental fitness were officially the product of “cheap fakes” and “misleading GOP videos.” Which is just as disturbing as the idea that we’re living in a Bouteflika presidency, as Jason Willick of The Washington Post explains:

The reversal of knowledge-making institutions on the question of Biden’s age has been so sudden, so violent, so herd-like in its uniformity that it calls into question the very ability of America’s elite—as Biden rightly calls his media cheerleaders-turned-critics—to form opinions based on reason rather than fear.

Read the full column here. 

→It’s easy to overstate the degree to which Biden’s decline—which has been obvious for years—is driving Trump’s strong poll numbers, versus voter sentiment on major issues. In our June 27 issue, published before the debate, we noted a Gallup poll showing Trump with a +12 lead over Biden on a question asking voters which candidate they agreed with “on the issues that matter to you most.” On Friday, Gallup published a new poll showing voter sentiment on one of Trump’s core issues. The survey found that 55% of voters, and 50% of independents, want immigration decreased—compared to 16% who want it increased and 25% who want to keep it at current levels. 

→In Israel, talks are continuing over a potential cease-fire deal with Hamas, along with the usual recriminations. On Thursday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued an updated list of the four nonnegotiable demands he first put out on Sunday, after having toughened two of them. Bibi clarified that Israel would need to retain control of the Philadelphi Corridor and the Rafah border crossing to prevent weapons smuggling from Egypt—one day after Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told the Americans that Israel could be flexible on the Philadelphi question—and would need to prevent the return of weapons and Hamas militants to northern Gaza, presumably by retaining control of the Netzarim Corridor, which bisects northern and southern Gaza.

These conditions prompted a considerable amount of carping from unnamed “Israeli officials” to the American press, with some sources accusing Netanyahu of attempting to sabotage talks. But Mossad chief David Barnea—generally seen as a “liberal”—issued a strong statement of support for Bibi’s conditions on Thursday, telling Israel’s YNet News that “without the clauses that Prime Minister Netanyahu insists on, we will not be able to renew the war [after the deal], and without it, we will not win and we will not return all of the hostages.” An Israeli official told Axios that Netanyahu’s conditions were hardening in part due to intelligence assessments that Hamas’ military position is weakening and that the terror group is increasingly desperate for a cease-fire. 

→The IDF announced Friday morning that it had discovered a weapons cache and Hamas command room in UNRWA’s headquarters in Gaza City. According to Times of Israel military correspondent Emanuel Fabian, Israeli troops raided the compound earlier this week in pursuit of Hamas operatives who had taken shelter there. Separately, the Israeli Foreign Ministry on July 4 submitted a list to UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini listing 108 UNRWA employees who the IDF had confirmed were members of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The letter, first reported yesterday by the German tabloid Bild, included the names, passports, and “military ID numbers” of the terrorists and warned that the 108 represented only a “small fraction” of the terrorists employed by the agency.

→Iran’s responsibility for the Oct. 7 massacre isn’t exactly a secret—unless you’re working for the current U.S. administration—but the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) has compiled a helpful list of recent statements by Iranian officials claiming, in so many words, “We did it!” For instance:

• On April 3, the Coalition Council of the Islamic Revolution Forces, in a statement mourning the death of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Gen. Mohammad Reza Zahedi in an Israeli airstrike in Syria, stated, “The strategic role of the martyr Zahedi in consolidating and strengthening the resistance front, and in the planning and execution of Al-Aqsa Flood, are part of the great pride that will transform the quiet efforts of this great commander into the eternal history of the struggle against the occupation by the Zionist regime.”

• Gen. Mohsen Chizari, a senior IRGC Quds Force commander, told Iranian state media in a May 12 interview, “The honorable [Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei] is the commander of the resistance axis, and he alone directs, leads and commands it. At one point, the command in the area was in the hands of Hajj Qassem [Soleimani], who worked under Khamenei. Under this command, other commanders [including Hajj Rahimi] successfully advanced the resistance front to a certain place, the result of which was Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.”

• On Jan. 2, IRGC spokesman Ramazan Sharif claimed that the Oct. 7 attack was “one of the resistance axis’s acts of vengeance against the Zionists for the killing of [IRGC Quds Force commander Gen. Qassim] Soleimani” in January 2020. This statement was removed from the public transcript of Sharif’s remarks several hours after its publication.

Perhaps someone could forward the MEMRI report to U.S. National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby, who assured the American public on Oct. 11 that the United States hadn’t found any “specific evidence” that the Iranians were “wittingly involved” in Oct. 7. 

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TODAY IN TABLET: 

Holy Delmore, by David Mikics

The originary 20th-century American Jewish writer and poet is famous for his descent into drug-addled madness. A new collection shows quantities of self-obsessed dreck shot through with redeeming literary and critical genius.

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The Egoz Boys

Talking to one of the IDF’s elite commando units about Gaza, avoiding civilian casualties, and trying not to worry their moms

By The Tablet Audience Editors

We talked to some members of the Israel Defense Forces Egoz unit, an elite commando unit specializing in guerrilla warfare, special reconnaissance, and fighting in complex terrains.

We asked them about going into Gaza after Oct. 7, near-death experiences, and staying sane when you're a 24-year-old with your friends' lives in your hands.