By rejecting US President Joe Biden's offer to stop the war in Gaza last Friday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is actually going to force the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague to declare himself a 'war criminal'. Israel as a state must do the same.
To respond negatively to Biden's best offer of a ceasefire and the protection of Israeli hostages would be to commit a war crime.
Not only that, saying 'no' to Biden means saying 'yes' to more senseless and massive bloodshed. This bloodshed is of Israeli soldiers, more than of Gazans. Saying yes means the death of those held hostage by Hamas. This 'yes' means saying 'yes' to genocide; Saying 'yes' to spreading the war to the north; Saying 'yes' to the declaration of Israel as a neutral state.
By saying "no" to Biden, Netanyahu actually said "yes" to everything mentioned. And anyone who can say 'yes' like that should be declared a war criminal in his own country unless all of us Israelis are war criminals.
Between Friday and Saturday night, many may have speculated that Netanyahu would agree to Biden's proposal and that would end the war. The U.S. proposal, apparently given to Netanyahu, is a shrewd diplomatic plan to emerge from the disastrous state of Israeli-Palestinian relations. No better plan has been found before. This opens up a last chance for Israel to abandon the war and minimize losses.
But when each Saturday was over, the warlords all awoke from their Sabbath (the Jewish weekly day of rest observed with prayer). Biden chose Friday evening to present his plan to secular Israelis, giving us a glimmer of hope. But that quickly dissipated when three Saturday evening stars appeared in Israel's sky, signaling the end of the Sabbath. At the same time informed that the war will continue.
Biden wanted better. But Israel has dishonest intentions. Biden wants peace, but Israel wants war. Even Hamas now wants peace more than Israel.
Biden wants to end all of this. He has been wanting for a long time. He wants to, but he's not doing a thing. When he presented his plan on Friday, a stark sentence should have been added: If Israel rejects the plan, the United States will immediately cut off arms supplies. It must be done immediately. Only then will this nightmare end, an end to a dire situation that shows no signs of ending.
Throughout this war I have not believed that Netanyahu was driven only by considerations of his own political consequences. The Netanyahu I know, I believe he has other considerations. By saying 'no' to Biden, he is erasing the remaining qualities of a statesman in him. Of course, if anything like that really remains at all.
And that is, the impression of being restrained even a little. We have come to believe over the years that when the army is sent in and war is started, Netanyahu is the most cautious and modest prime minister in Israel. But since the October 7 war last year, this belief has been shattered.
Continuing the war would put an end to this perception of him forever. And continuing the war will also fuel doubts about the motives of Netanyahu and his allies and right-wing coercives. They all want genocide. There is no other way to describe their vindictiveness and bloodlust.
Apart from that no one needs to wait to hear anything from them. On Saturday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) left leaflets in Beit Hanayoun asking refugees returning to destroyed homes to empty them again. And that is Israel's true response to President Biden's plan to end the war.
This event also shows the direction the war will take from now on. It will continue in an endless cycle of death and destruction. After Rafah we'll go back to the beginning, north of the Gaza Strip—like playing Monopoly (boardgame). But it was brutal and thence southward again to Rafah, through the ruins of Jabalia. It will continue like this in the blood-soaked mud.
Army printing press will not stop printing leaflets. Palestinian refugees will run from side to side like animals in the slaughterhouse, until the last stone of Gaza is uprooted. Or in the words of the poet Moshe Tabenkin—'Abandoned wood for the fire / Or coal for the furnace / A place without bread, fire and water / Where there are only handfuls of ashes.'
Biden wants to end all of this. He has been wanting for a long time. He wants to, but he's not doing a thing. When he presented his plan on Friday, a stark sentence should have been added: If Israel rejects the plan, the United States will immediately cut off arms supplies. It must be done immediately. Only then will this nightmare end, an end to a dire situation that shows no signs of ending.
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