President Joe Biden is holding up a shipment of 3,500 guided bombs to Israel after U.S.-backed negotiations for a ceasefire and an exchange of captives with Gaza broke down. It's the most significant exercise of U.S. leverage over Israel in a long time—and comes after Biden spent months resisting the idea of any limits on how the Israeli military could use American taxpayer aid.
For months, leaks had been coming out of the White House about how frustrated Biden was with the Israeli war effort. At the same time, the Biden administration pushed through weapons shipments to Israel without notifying Congress, reallocated weapons from Ukraine to Israel, rejected any conditions on that aid, and worked to pass several billion dollars in additional funding for Israel.
