In a rare Oval Office address, President Biden described the United States as “the indispensable nation,” standing by allies in the Middle East and in.
In a rare Oval Office address, President Biden described the United States as “the indispensable nation,” standing by allies in the Middle East and in Europe now under attack by Islamic terrorism and a Russian tyrant respectively. In this way, he linked the 20-month long Ukraine war with the new one in Israel.
Emphasizing the global nature of the conflict, Biden said America, and by extension the world, now faces “an inflection point.” Hamas and Russian President Vladimar Putin, he continued, are “different threats” but share a common goal: “They both want to completely annihilate a neighboring democracy.”
U.S. troops are not required on either front, according to the president. Instead, during an address that lasted just 15 minutes, Biden insisted from behind the Resolute Desk that only American munitions were needed, urging his countrymen to support Israel and Ukraine by continuing to reprise the role as “the arsenal of democracy.”
The White House will forward to Congress a request for as much as $100 billion in wartime aid, linking military assistance for Ukraine, that many Republicans are reluctant to approve, with money for munitions that GOP lawmakers are eager to send to Israel. Still without a speaker, or even a party leader, House Republicans may find themselves so at odds with one another that they are unable to register much resistance.
Biden asked – and then offered an answer – why Americans should care about a war in Europe that’s lasted more than 600 days and the one in Israel that Hamas began just last week.
“History has taught us that when terrorists don’t pay a price for their terror, when dictators don’t pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos and death and more destruction,” the president said. “They keep going. And the cost and the threats to America and the world keep rising.
