President Joe Biden made a rare personal appearance in the White House briefing room on Friday and told Israel that it should not hit Iran’s oil facilities in response to this week’s ballistic missile attack.
“Look, the Israelis have not concluded what they will do in terms of a strike. It’s under discussion. If I were in their shoes, I would be thinking about other alternatives than striking oil fields.”
Biden had said earlier in the week that Israel should not attack Iran’s nuclear sites.
Reliably left-wing reporter Weijia Jiang of CBS News asked Biden whether he thought that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu might try to influence the U.S. election.
“No administration has helped Israel more than I have. None. None. None. And I think Bibi should remember that. And whether he’s trying to influence the election, I don’t know, but I’m not counting on that.”
President Donald Trump did more for Israel than any president since President Harry S. Truman, who recognized Israel upon its declaring independence in 1948.
Another reporter asked Biden why he expected Israel to listen to him given that “over the past few months, they’ve consistently defied your administration’s own advice.”
As the Times of Israel noted, the reporters were asking “leading questions goading him to criticize Israel.”
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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