How Biden is putting the heat on Netanyahu

President Joe Biden was so staunchly supportive of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when the Israel-Hamas war broke out that observers called Biden’s approach a bear hug.

That bear hug is turning into a vice-like grip.

The president and his aides are working to make sure Netanyahu is feeling the squeeze from all sides to quickly bring the war to an end. Biden is getting more combative himself, pushing rhetorically and behind the scenes to increase pressure from regional powers, the United Nations, aid groups, Israeli citizens and Netanyahu’s political allies and foes alike.

There’s a fear among many U.S. officials and others caught in the crisis that this could be the last best shot to bring home hostages held by Hamas and wind down the war without significantly more casualties. In many ways, the Biden team is going beyond its past efforts to persuade Netanyahu to act on U.S. advice, turning to more people and institutions than usual so that the Israeli prime minister feels the heat no matter where he turns.

“It feels a bit like a blunt-force instrument,” said Jonathan Lord, a former Defense Department official.

Of course, the pressure campaign also targets Hamas, but Netanyahu is in some ways the more complicated decision-maker, and the one that the U.S. has more power to directly influence.

The Israeli leader is facing pressure from within his government to abandon the cease-fire plan. Depending on what he does, he could lose his job and potentially land in prison. Such consequences make it hard for him to simply agree with U.S. pleas to support the deal, even though it is, technically, an Israeli proposal in the first place.

“Bibi is now trapped in his own web of political maneuvering between his coalition partners, the Americans and his security establishment,” said Adam Ereli, a former U.S. ambassador to Bahrain, using Netanyahu’s nickname. “He’s made promises to everyone but can fully deliver to no one.”

Biden’s decision to deliver a speech Friday outlining the Israeli proposal was just the initial public shot in the U.S. effort, although Israel was given a heads-up about the address. The president laid out a multiphase plan he said was proposed by Israeli negotiators as a pathway to permanently end the fighting. There’s hope among U.S. officials that Hamas and Israel can at least agree to the first phase, which would include a temporary cease-fire and some hostage and Palestinian prisoner releases.

U.S. officials, such as Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have since hit the phones, talking to counterparts in countries such as Egypt, Morocco and Qatar who can pressure Netanyahu but also Hamas, according to the State Department, which released readouts. (American officials don’t directly engage with Hamas because the U.S. has designated it a terrorist organization.)

Blinken also held calls with two key members of Netanyahu’s war cabinet: Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Benny Gantz. Both are unhappy with how Netanyahu is handling the war effort.

Gantz in particular is an opponent of Netanyahu who joined his coalition after Hamas sparked the war on Oct. 7 by killing some 1,200 people in Israel. Gantz has already threatened to leave Netanyahu’s coalition by Saturday if the Israeli prime minister doesn’t come up with a better vision for the Gaza war, including a post-conflict plan.

A Gantz departure wouldn’t necessarily collapse Netanyahu’s coalition. But if two other ministers walk away, it could.

Those two ministers, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, oppose the cease-fire plan, complaining that it would leave Hamas in power. The pair are far-right figures with stridently anti-Palestinian views who want Israel to fully take over the Gaza Strip.

Netanyahu already is deeply unpopular in Israel, but should he lose his prime ministership, he could become more vulnerable on the legal front. He’s facing multiple corruption charges in Israeli courts.

Aware of all this, the Israeli leader, often via aides, has sent mixed signals about what he actually believes when it comes to the cease-fire proposal his country’s negotiators have set forth. The statements, such as one saying Israel remains committed to “the destruction of Hamas’ military and governing capabilities,” have muddied the situation.

An aide to Netanyahu declined to comment. But U.S. officials are well aware of the political dynamics involved in the crisis.

“We have no doubt that the deal will be characterized by Israel and be characterized by Hamas, but we know the text of the deal,” said a senior Biden administration official, having been granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue.

Biden and top deputies often prefer to stress that the onus is on Hamas to agree to the proposal.

“The Israeli government has reconfirmed repeatedly, as recently as today, that that proposal is still on the table, and now it’s up to Hamas to accept it, and the whole world should call on Hamas to accept it,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Wednesday on NBC’s "Today" show.

And some former U.S. officials argue that Hamas militant boss Yahya Sinwar may prove a tougher target to convince than Netanyahu. The militant, who may be in hiding in Gaza, has seen the turmoil the war has caused within American politics, including on U.S. college campuses, as well as how it has made Israel the subject of much international opprobrium.

“Sinwar believes he’s winning. He believes he has the upper hand in public sentiment,” said Lord, who is now with the Center for a New American Security. Lord warned, “If Sinwar believes Netanyahu is facing more pressure, he is willing to go second to make any agreement.”

Biden also hasn’t spoken to Netanyahu in the past week, but that could be because he’s saving that tactic for a later stage.

Meanwhile, CIA Director William Burns and National Security Council Middle East official Brett McGurk are back in the region this week talking to partners about ways to push the deal through.

The Biden administration also has reached out to aid groups operating in Gaza to try to get their support for the proposal. They’ve briefed the groups on the plan and discussed options to protect their staffers on the ground once a final agreement is reached.

The leaders of the Group of Seven countries — which includes the U.S and other major democracies — issued a joint statement on Monday endorsing the cease-fire proposal. The United States, Egypt and Qatar issued a similar statement on Saturday.

The U.S. is even turning to the U.N. Security Council in a bid to get further endorsement for the plan via a resolution.

It’s a risky move given the rivalries between the U.S., Russia and China that have derailed past resolutions related to the war in Gaza. But it suggests that Washington believes that having the debate will show it is serious about ending the conflict.

While in various forums Biden points to the need to end the suffering of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, he also has political interests in seeing the war end. His staunch support for Israel has infuriated many Arab Americans whose votes could be critical in swing states such as Michigan during November’s presidential election.

Biden has a decades-long relationship with Netanyahu, and it has taken a turn for the worse as the war has dragged on. But the president has to date resisted calls to put broad holds on U.S. military aid to Israel, though he has held back some weapons.

In an interview with Time magazine published this week, but which appeared to have been conducted prior to his Friday speech, Biden was asked if Netanyahu was prolonging the war to stay in power.

He wouldn’t directly comment, but said “there is every reason for people to draw that conclusion.”

Erin Banco and Matt Berg contributed to this report.