How fortunate! We’ve been gifted a copy of Obama bro Ben Rhodes’ piece in the New York Times on Monday about how the Democrats blew it in Gaza. All right, we’ll take a look. Rhodes writes:
Less than two weeks after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, President Joe Biden traveled to Israel and held Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in an embrace. The image captured the solidarity Americans felt with Israelis after they suffered such horrific violence. It also symbolized a political and governing reflex within the Democratic Party.
During the Biden presidency, it was short-handed the “hug Bibi” strategy — the idea that smothering Mr. Netanyahu with unconditional support would give the U.S. leverage to influence his actions. Over the final 15 months of the Biden presidency, this approach led the White House to provide a flood of weapons for Israel’s bombardment of Palestinians, veto United Nations Security Council resolutions calling for a cease-fire, attack the International Criminal Court for pursuing charges against Mr. Netanyahu, ignore its own policies about supporting military units credibly accused of war crimes and blame Hamas for not accepting cease-fire terms that the Israeli government was also rejecting.
This approach made Democrats hypocrites when defending a “rules-based order,” racial equality and democracy. It alienated elements of their base and placed them out of step with younger voters. And in an age of authoritarianism, fealty to an Israeli strongman who routinely humiliated them made Democrats appear weak: Mr. Netanyahu was hugged all the way into the arms of Donald Trump.
…
By the time I worked in Barack Obama’s White House, Israel was a regional military superpower. Israeli settlements mushroomed across the West Bank. A growing enterprise of security barriers, checkpoints and restrictions on work and freedom of movement consigned Palestinians to a suppressed existence. Hamas controlled Gaza, which was strangled by a permanent Israeli blockade and devastated by episodic wars. The Palestinian Authority governed less than half the West Bank and was delegitimized by its corruption and cooperation with Israeli security forces.
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Wow, Rhodes siding with Hamas. Who could have imagined?
His nickname inside the Obama administration was “Hamas” Rhodes. https://t.co/3qZi2cHHgk
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) December 1, 2025
Relevant facts about Ben Rhodes in the context of his NYT op-ed:
1) Rhodes was so extreme that his own Obama WH colleagues nicknamed him “Hamas”
2) Rhodes bragged about how he created a left-wing media echo chamber to sell the Iran deal by manipulating know-nothing reporters. pic.twitter.com/ldoZuWUaxW
— AG (@AGHamilton29) December 1, 2025
Lazar Berman, Christian affairs correspondent for The Times of Israel, did a deep dive on Rhodes’ piece.
Senior Obama natl security official @brhodes has a NYT editorial on Biden & Gaza, full of odd claims abt the war, and plenty of tropes abt Jewish money & Israel keeping the Dems from winning elections and perfecting the world.
— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Rhodes: Biden gave Bibi ‘unconditional support’ to give the US leverage over him.
An odd claim. Biden held up key arms shipments & the Rafah operation for months. He lost leverage as his WH turned more on Isr.
Trump got to a Gaza ceasefire bc of his embrace of Isr
2/11— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Rhodes: Siding with Israel over Hamas was hypocritical for Dems defending a “rules-based order,” racial equality & democracy.
Huh? What does backing Isr have to do with *racial equality*?
And Isr is a democracy fighting Hamas – the least democratic entity one could imagine.
3/11— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Rhodes: Dems can’t side with a ‘right-wing govt determined to block…a Palestinian state’
That is not ‘right wing.’ That is consensus for Israel’s mainstream. Golan’s leftwing Democrats isn’t pushing for a state.
Maybe left-wing Israelis know something Rhodes doesn’t?4/11
— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Rhodes: ‘The centerpiece of Biden’s MidEast policy remained the Abraham Accords.’
This is the admin that wouldn’t say the words ‘Abraham Accords’ at the outset.
And Rhodes blasts Ab Accords for being w autocrats and sidelining Pals. As if Pal leaders would be democrats. 5/11
— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Rhodes: After Oct 7, Isr leaders were “referring to Palestinians in Gaza as ‘human animals’” & cutting all Gaza off. He links to Def Min Gallant speaking in Hebrew on Oct 9…
Who was clearly referring to Hamas as animals,
and a siege on *Gaza City* ahead of major combat
6/11— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
It was a two-week news cycle when President Donald Trump called MS-13 gang members “animals.”
Rhodes: Isr leaders said that Palestinians were living in “an evil city”
Netanyahu on Oct 9: “Any place Hamas deploys, in this evil city, all the places Hamas is hiding, operating — we will turn it into a ruin.”
Hardly evidence of calling for attacks on all Palestinians.7/11
— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Rhodes: “If you believe a Pal child is equal in dignity & worth to an Isr or US child, it is no longer possible to support this Israeli govt”
That’s simply not how laws of war work. All countries prioritize the safety of their own civilians.
Wonder what he’d say abt WW2.8/11
— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
And ofc, his AIPAC obsession: “AIPAC donors” “More Democrats are refusing to take AIPAC money.”
Jewish money controlling US politics.
Even worse – He says American democracy can’t be restored “if it is beholden” to AIPAC and its financing of the far-right.
9/11
— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
This sentence is especially egregious: “Some political support may be lost if Democrats distance themselves from Israel, particularly among donors.”
= Rich Jews will be mad.
10/11
— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Antisemitism has always been about blaming Jews for the evils keeping the world from being redeemed.
And…Rhodes argues that Israel and AIPAC are the reason for growing authoritarianism, Dems losing to Trump, & Dems being unable to ‘build the world they want.”
11/11— Lazar Berman (@Lazar_Berman) December 1, 2025
Ben “Hamas” Rhodes dabbling in antisemitic tropes pic.twitter.com/BLc2sCvIyc
— Jake Donnelly (@RedWhiteBlueJew) December 1, 2025
Everytime Rhodes provides a window into his thinking, it becomes even more disturbing how vacuous and unserious it is. That he was considered to have had a mind-meld with Obama is most frightening of all.
— Steve Zivin (@steve_zivin) December 1, 2025
Rhodes continues to be an enemy of Israel and demonize Jews. There’s a reason his nickname was Hamas.
— Danny Rosenstein 🇺🇸🇮🇱🎗️🤟🏻 (@DannyR_66) December 1, 2025
The sanction relief that Ben & his boss gave the Islamic Republic allowed it to finance and train the terrorists for the 10/7/23 atrocities. Ben should really slither back under the rock he crawled out from before someone notices his responsibility: Hamas murdered 50 Americans
— JL Sherman (@jsherman39) December 1, 2025
I will never understand the leftist love of Hamas. Lily white guy spends a whole career as a useful idiot simping for people who would lop his head off.
— Banana In The Tailpipe (@TailpipeBanana) December 1, 2025
Ben Rhodes is a malignant cancer
— Panda_Prime 📟 (@pandaagendaforu) December 1, 2025
Looking back, it’s astonishing that any of the Obama bros were allowed anywhere near the president. Does anyone have video of Rhodes crying when Trump hit Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities?
For his part, President Biden did build that floating aid dock to deliver aid to the Palestinians that lasted a whole 20 days. He tried to appease the anti-Israel wing of his party.
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