The overstretched superpower
America’s polarisation and congressional paralysis. Republicans, especially those of Mr Trump’s “America First" tendency, have grown ever more sceptical about supporting Ukraine in its war. And Congress, unable to pass bills since the removal of the speaker of the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy, on October 3rd, got a new one, Mike Johnson, only this week.
Mr Biden hopes cross-party sympathy for Israel will unblock things. He has asked Congress for a massive $106bn in supplemental national-security spending. He seeks to pre-empt future divisive votes on Ukraine by allocating $61bn in military and economic aid to the country, to tide it through America’s febrile 2024 election season.
To make it more palatable, he has wrapped it in other spending that Republicans should find more appealing, including $14bn for Israel; $2bn for military-equipment transfers in the Indo-Pacific (probably to Taiwan); nearly $12bn in various measures to strengthen the processing of migrants on the southern border; and $3bn for the submarine defence-industrial base. “Hamas and Putin represent different threats, but they share this in common: they both want to completely annihilate a neighbouring democracy," declared Mr Biden. Yet Israel’s war is different from Ukraine’s in several respects.
One concerns international perceptions. America helps Ukraine in the name of the UN charter, the inviolability of sovereign borders and human rights. In defending Israel, America is backing a country that breaches international law by building Jewish settlements in occupied territories, rejects statehood for Palestinians and stands accused of imposing collective punishments on Palestinians, if not committing war crimes, in its bombardment and siege
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