Ben Weingarten writes for the Federalist about President Biden’s misguided foreign policy ideas.
The Biden administration’s responses to two seemingly unrelated events — coming on the heels of an escalation in its maximum pressure campaign to restrain Israel by in part fomenting a coup against its prime minister — reveals the president’s stubborn commitment to an “Iran First” agenda that imperils America and our allies.
The first of the events was when Iran’s president and foreign minister, among others, were reportedly found dead in a helicopter crash during a return trip from the Iran-Azerbaijan border on May 20. Ebrahim Raisi, the eighth president of Iran, was one of the casualties. However, the world is undoubtedly a better place without Raisi in it. His reputation richly earned the moniker the “Butcher of Tehran.”
The administration’s first concern was about ensuring Iran knew the U.S. did not assassinate Raisi, lest it incur Tehran’s wrath. Out of fear, it chose to appease by treating Raisi like any other fallen foreign leader. The appeasement was ham-handed, granted sucking up to the regime could have made the Biden administration look a bit more guilty. The State Department extended its “official condolences.”
When the United Nations Security Council held a moment of silence for Raisi, U.S. Deputy Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood stood in solidarity with our adversaries to honor him.
Raisi, a U.S.-sanctioned should-have-been-pariah seen as a potential successor to the evil theocrat Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, oversaw the execution of thousands of political prisoners in the 1980s, cracked down on the Green Movement protests in 2009, and likewise brutally suppressed the “Woman, Life, Freedom” protesters of recent years. This list is not exhaustive of the terror Raisi has caused. …
… Recall that the Biden administration worked overtime to de-link Iran from the Oct. 7 attack and prevented Israel from striking Iran-backed Hezbollah hard in the massacre’s wake, forcing tens of thousands of Israelis to evacuate from the north and rendering them refugees in their own country now for over half a year.
