Tipsheet

Netanyahu Set to Address Congress This Week, but Biden and Harris Are No-Shows

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  July 22, 2024 7:15 PM

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to address a joint session of Congress on Wednesday of this week, but it looks like he'll be doing so without much involvement from President Joe Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris. Netanyahu arrived in the country earlier on Monday. Biden, Harris, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken were both absent when he landed.

This isn't the only slight from Biden and Harris towards Netanyahu, though. It was recently reported that Biden won't be appearing for a meeting with Netanyahu, per The Times of Israel. Neither Biden nor Harris will be presiding over Netanyahu's address on Wednesday. Retiring Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, will preside instead, according to The Hill. 

While Biden won't meet with the prime minister, former and potentially future President Donald Trump may do so. POLITICO reported that Netanyahu has requested a meeting with Trump, which has not been ruled out. 

Netanyahu's address takes place more than nine months after Hamas terrorists slaughtered 1,200 people, most of them civilians, on October 7. Not even babies or Holocaust suvivors were spared. They also engaged in rape, torture, and kidnapping, with Hamas terrorists taking approximately 250 people hostage. Last week's Republican National Committtee in Milwaukee featured parents of one of the American hostages. Omer Neutra spent his 22nd birthday in captivity, his mother, Orna, revealed last Wednesday. 

Many anti-Israel Democrats are expected to boycott the address and hold other programming. 

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Democrats, meanwhile, are trying to rally around Vice President Kamala Harris' likelihood of becoming the party's nominee. Biden officially withdrew from the race on Sunday and endorsed Harris not long after that. That president has yet to be seen in public since then has raised concerns, though he supposedly called and was put on speaker phone when Harris gave remarks on Monday. 

When it comes to the issue of supporting our ally in the Middle East, Democrats have also been in disarray, with many members, including but not limited to those in the Squad, expressing anti-Israel and pro-Hamas sentiments. The Biden administration has become increasingly anti-Israel as the Israel-Hamas war wages on, likely as Democrats worry about winning key swing states like Michigan in November. 

There's also supposedly a "risk" should Harris be the nominee and pick Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) as a possible running mate, given that Shapiro is Jewish. Harris has also been called out for being even more radically anti-Israel than Biden.