Kamala Harris and Donald Trump will hold their first and perhaps only debate tonight, and the question on everyone’s mind is: What will Harris say on various issues she has studiously avoided giving straight answers about? But when it comes to the Middle East and specifically the Israel-Hamas war, a better question might be: What does Harris know?
Harris’s answers on foreign policy are interesting because it’s the one topic on which she routinely and proudly admits to being in office. Normally she tries to pin incumbency on Trump, as when she told CNN’s Dana Bash that she and running mate Tim Walz intend to “turn the page on the last decade of what I believe has been contrary to where the spirit of our country really lies.” Bash reminded the would-be president that “the last three and a half years has been part of your administration.”
Not so on national security, where Harris knows she has to boost her credentials. Harris likes to remind the room that she was the one who the administration sent to the 2022 Munich security conference to warn Ukraine that the Russians were coming, and to put Vladimir Putin on notice. Volodymyr Zelensky, however, might remember it a bit differently.
“Kamala Harris said the attack was unavoidable,” Ukraine’s then-defense minister Oleksiy Reznikov told Time’s Simon Shuster. “What President Zelensky said to that was: I get it. Our intelligence also sees this information.” Ukraine didn’t need a Paul Revere; it needed a U.S. that was prepared to act.
“Zelensky urged the U.S. to impose preemptive sanctions against Russia, arguing that would force Vladimir Putin to rethink his decision to invade,” Shuster writes. “If the attack was indeed unavoidable, Zelensky argued, the U.S. should flood weapons into Ukraine, including the anti-aircraft systems, fighter jets and heavy artillery needed to prevent Russian forces from overrunning the country.” He notes: “Harris rejected both suggestions.”
We should expect to hear the first half of that story tonight, when the candidates are asked about Ukraine. But when it comes to the Middle East, Harris has no standard I-was-there declaration, not even a misleading one. And no one really knows precisely how she would handle the war, except that she has worked furiously behind the scenes to leave the impression that she intends to be much tougher on Israel and will have no patience for talk of victory: She wants the parties to settle the case before there’s a new American administration, when she might become officially responsible for it.
The problem is that when she talks about the war, she sounds the way a deer caught in headlights looks.
Harris wants a ceasefire. Hamas doesn’t. Surely there’s a plan B?
In fact, there is not. There are just canned lines about devastation in Gaza and the need for the guns to fall silent.
After Hamas executed six hostages last week, including the American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Harris posted tough words for the terrorists: “Today, @POTUS and I met with the U.S. hostage deal negotiation team. The murder of Hersh Goldberg-Polin and five other hostages was a brutal, barbaric act by Hamas terrorists. As @POTUS said, Hamas leaders will pay for these crimes.” And what action will be taken? “It is long past time for a ceasefire and hostage deal. We need to bring the hostages home and end the suffering in Gaza.”
In July, she met privately with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and took no questions afterwards. Her message was a familiar one: “Today, I had a frank and constructive meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu about a wide range of issues, including my commitment to Israel’s security, the importance of addressing the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and the urgent need to get the ceasefire and hostage deal done.”
In March, Harris had delivered the same message: “What we are seeing every day in Gaza is devastating. As we’ve said, there is a deal on the table that includes a 6-week ceasefire, which would get hostages out and aid in. Hamas needs to accept it.”
This week, the Harris campaign finally released an “issues” page on its website. If you were hoping for clarification, you have not been paying attention (and also you will have been disappointed). Here’s the entirety of the Israel-Gaza section:
“Vice President Harris will never hesitate to take whatever action is necessary to protect U.S. forces and interests from Iran and Iran-backed terrorist groups. Vice President Harris will always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself and she will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself. She and President Biden are working to end the war in Gaza, such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom, and self-determination. She and President Biden are working around the clock to get a hostage deal and a ceasefire deal done.”
Once again: What will Harris actually do as president? She will ceasefire away all the world’s problems.
The war has changed a lot in the many months that Harris has been chanting “ceasefire ceasefire ceasefire.” America’s role in that war has changed as well—remember the Gaza pier to nowhere? But Harris hasn’t adjusted to the realities on the ground. Which leads one to wonder what Harris knows about the reality on the ground.
Harris famously said that the Palestinians of Rafah could not be evacuated because there was nowhere for them to go—she studied the maps! Soon after, Israel relocated 1 million Palestinians from Rafah.
Harris doesn’t have policies, she has incantations. She demonstrates memorization but not knowledge. Harris doesn’t need to “say the right things” tonight at the debate. She needs to say anything of substance. She needs to demonstrate that she has thoughts of her own, and that those thoughts include serious study of the war in which, as we speak, American citizens are still being held hostage and still dying.
