The Biden administration kept President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration closely apprised of its efforts to broker the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hezbollah that took effect early Wednesday, according to the outgoing Democratic administration.
Trump’s team, meanwhile, was quick to spike the football and claim credit for the rare spot of good news for a Democratic administration that’s been dragged down by the grinding Mideast conflict.
“Everyone is coming to the table because of President Trump,” Florida Rep. Mike Waltz, Trump’s choice for his national security adviser, said in a post on X on Tuesday, shortly before the Israel Cabinet signed off on the agreement. “His resounding victory sent a clear message to the rest of the world that chaos won’t be tolerated. I’m glad to see concrete steps towards deescalation in the Middle East.”
The Biden administration’s reported coordination with Trump’s team on its efforts to forge the ceasefire in Lebanon is perhaps the highest-profile example of cooperation in what’s been a sometimes choppy transition period.
Trump’s transition team just Tuesday reached a required agreement with President Joe Biden’s White House that will allow transition staff to coordinate with the existing federal workforce before Trump takes office on Jan. 20. There has been some coordination on high levels between the outgoing Biden and incoming Trump teams, including talks between Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan and Waltz.
Biden in Rose Garden remarks on Tuesday cheered the ceasefire agreement as a critical step that he hoped could be the catalyst for a broader peace in the Mideast, which has been shaken by nearly 14 months of war following Hamas’ attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
“This is designed to be a permanent cessation of hostilities,” Biden said. “What is left of Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations will not be allowed — I emphasize, will not be allowed — to threaten the security of Israel again.”
White House officials are now hopeful that a calm in Lebanon will reinvigorate a multi-country effort at finding an endgame to the devastating war in Gaza, where Hamas is still holding dozens of hostages and the conflict is more intractable.
Biden said the U.S., as well as Israel, will engage in talks in the coming days with officials from Egypt, Qatar and Turkey to try to get Gaza talks back on track.
But during Biden’s moment of success in a conflict that has roiled his reputation at home and abroad, the specter of the incoming Trump administration loomed large.
Trump’s senior national security team was briefed by the Biden administration as negotiations unfolded and finally came to a conclusion on Tuesday, according to a senior Biden administration official. The official, who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity on a call organized by the White House, added that the incoming Trump administration officials were not directly involved in the talks, but that it was important that they knew “what we were negotiating and what the commitments were.”
Trump’s team and allies, meanwhile, said there was no doubt that the prospect of the Republican president returning to power pushed both sides to get the agreement done.
Waltz, in addition to giving Trump credit for the ceasefire deal coming together, added a warning to Iran, Hezbollah’s chief financial backer.
“But let’s be clear: The Iran Regime is the root cause of the chaos & terror that has been unleashed across the region. We will not tolerate the status quo of their support for terrorism,” Waltz said in his post.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Trump ally, also gave a shoutout to the incoming administration, while giving a nod to Biden’s team.
“I appreciate the hard work of the Biden Administration, supported by President Trump, to make this ceasefire a reality,” Graham said in a statement.
Richard Goldberg, a senior adviser at the Washington group Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, said the moment magnifies that Iran — which he said would have needed to approve of Hezbollah agreeing to the ceasefire — is carefully weighing what lays ahead with Trump.
“There’s zero doubt that Iran is pulling back to regroup ahead of Trump coming into office,” said Goldberg, a National Security Council official in Trump’s first administration. “It’s a combination of Israeli military success and Trump’s election — the ayatollah has no clothes and he knows we know.”
The Biden White House is also holding on to a sliver of hope that the Lebanon ceasefire deal could help reinvigorate a long sought after Israel-Saudi normalization deal.
The official said a “lot of work has been done” to get such an agreement on track “but clearly where we are in Gaza is holding us back.”
Biden has said his administration was tantalizingly close to reaching a deal between the Middle East’s two most important powers shortly before the Hamas attack sent tremors throughout the region. He has speculated that the emerging normalization deal was part of Hamas’ motivation in carrying out its attack on Israel when it did.
Just weeks before the attack, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sat beside Biden on the sidelines of the annual U.N. General Assembly and marveled that a “historic peace between Israel and Saudi Arabia” seemed within reach — a diplomatic advance that the Israeli leader predicted could lead to lasting peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.
The so-called normalization push, which began during Trump’s first administration and was branded the Abraham Accords, is an ambitious effort to reshape the region and boost Israel’s standing.
The Biden White House plans to keep the incoming Trump administration looped in on its efforts and “anything that we will do on this … we won’t do this unless they know what we’re doing,” the Biden administration official said.
(AP)
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7 Responses
So remarkably reminiscent of 1/20/1981 the American Embassy hostages being released prior to swearing in of President Ronald Reagan because Iran was TERRIFIED of President Ronald Reagan, just like both hamas & hezbollah are TERRIFIED of President Elect Donald Trump שליט”א
Of course. Everything is always Trump’s win. And if it goes bad it will be totally Biden’s fault. Sadly the minions in his cult believe it all.
Totally agree with crazykanoly.
If it works, Trump the Shlump was responsible.
If it don’t work, it’s Biden’s fault.
I predicted this a week ago. Tapping myself on the shoulder. LOL>
Jake Sullivan said it best. “I would just point out that you know you’ve done a really good thing when other people take credit for it,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan says in an interview.
147: Nobody is scared of the man who wants to capitulate to Putin, says he fell in love with Kim, freed 5000 Taliban fighters and left the Kurds to die. Trump goes around yelling he will not start wars. When you broadcast to your enemies that you are not willing to fight why would anyone be scared of him. The only ones who are concerned about Trump are American allies like Canada, Mexico and NATO members who know that Trump will through them under the bus.
This sounds questionable but is actually true. The main feature of this agreement is that US will be directly involved in the issues arising during implementation – and the period starts in 60 days – that is right after re-inauguration. Would Bibi be comfortable signing such a deal if Kamala were to be a referee? I don’t think so. Q.E.D.
@crazykanoiy:
I’m going to disagree with you here. Trump, for the most part, hadn’t “capitulated” to Putin. True, in rhetoric he’d made some errors, however, in policy, he supplied Ukraine with weapons and the like to scare Putin off. He tried to get the Europeans to stop getting oil from Russia, so they wouldn’t be dependent on an enemy. Plus, he allegedly told Putin if he touches Ukraine, he’d “bomb Moscow.” When Putin responded “no you won’t, Mr. President,” Trump retorted “I might!” It was exactly Trump’s unpredictability that made him effective.
If you feel Trump had “capitulated” to Putin, then you should also feel that Biden “capitulated” to Putin. After all, he appeared weak when he said NATO’s response would depend on what Putin did, by saying “it’s one thing if it’s a minor incursion,” and he’s been slow walking aide to Ukraine this entire war up until this past week. Biden hasn’t set ANY goal for Ukraine victory. He just sends them a bunch of cash and old outdated weapons. If he’d given them real high tech weapons right away, there could’ve been a chance for Ukraine to get back some territory. At this point in time, where Russia clearly has the upper hand, I don’t think it’s “capitulating” to Putin to try to find an off-ramp to end a war where thousands are dying, and Ukraine has no shot to take back Crimea or the like at this point in time.
I agree Trump shouldn’t use the term “fall in love” with Kim, but at the same time, it was his very tough stance with Kim in the beginning of his term that got Kim to come to the table, temporarily stop launching test rockets, and returned American hostages in the first place.
Now, what I disagree most with was the last part of your post. Trump hasn’t gone around shouting he’s not willing to fight. Sure, he points out that under his admin, we didn’t get into any new wars, but he’s been consistently explaining it’d be the same as his first term, and that is “peace through strength.” He’s just against regieme-change. Someone “not willing to fight,” doesn’t drop the MOAB, kill Quasam Sollimani, move the embassy to Yerushaliyum (despite push-back), drastically sanction Iran, destroy large parts of ISIS, get the Abraham Accords created, threaten the leader of the Taliban’s life with a picture of his house, etc. People call him an isolationist, while his first term clearly showed he isn’t.
Meanwhile, Biden showed HE’S “not willing to fight” by the disasterous withdrawl from Afghanistan (which I know technically Trump started, but he didn’t want to leave the weapons there, and Biden didn’t HAVE to do it), BEGGING Iran for another Iran deal, sending BILLIONS of dollars to Iran (which gave them the money for their terror proxys), slow walked aide to Ukraine (with ZERO end goal), said a Russian “minor incursion” might go unpunished, ignores the attacks from the Houthis, kept telling Israel NOT to go into Rafah (which is how we killed Sinwar), keeps scolding Israel every oppertunity he gets, won’t give Israel the bulldozers they need, taking the Houthis off the terror watch-list, I could go on. Biden’s foreign policy has been one of the worst aspects of his admin by far.
If Biden were so great on foreign policy, Putin would’ve been too nervous to invade Ukraine, Iran would be too nervous to get it’s proxies to attack Israel, and Iran wouldn’t completely ignore Biden when he told Iran “don’t. (in regards to firing missiles at Israel) .” Meanwhile, Iran tried hacking Trump’s campaign and tried killing him. I think it’s pretty safe to say Iran wanted Harris to win (who’d even more anti-Israel than Biden).
In regards to our allies, look back at Trump’s first term, and you’ll see that the tariffs were always being used as a bargaining tool. It was those very tariffs that got the U.S. the better trade deal than NAFTA called the USMCA (even Biden admitted it was better). Further, those tariffs got Mexico to agree with the “Remain in Mexico” policy (IIRC). If Trump thought tariffs alone were great for the economy in the long term (which would indeed be incorrect), he would’ve just kept them on for four years, but he didn’t. Further, he wouldn’t have appointed Kevin Hasset to the National Economic Counsel (who’s very pro-free market). And it’s the same in regards to NATO. Every time Trump would threaten them, it was to get the other partners to pay more of their fair share, which is exactly what happened.
Now, I don’t suspect I’ll change your mind, but at the very least, I figured it’d be conducive to see a different side of the argument.