We understand that “jaw, jaw” is better than “war, war” as Churchill observed, but talking to terrorists should be off the table when they are so closely allied to a sovereign nation. Amos Hochstein, a U.S. envoy and a senior adviser to U.S. President Joe Biden, whose Middle East record includes totally misreading the Saudis on oil last year and then championing a maritime-border deal between Israel and Lebanon that delivered neither gas nor peace, has inexplicably arrived in Beirut for meetings with Lebanese leaders
US envoy Amos Hochstein landed in Beirut. He will meet with Lebanese Prime Minister Mikati but also with Speaker of the Parliament and head of the Amal movement Nabih Berri, who is a cutout for Hezbollah. Why is the US negotiating with Hezbollah/Iran now?
— Mike (@Doranimated) November 7, 2023
Hochstein said in Beirut Tuesday that Washington doesn’t want the ongoing war in Gaza to expand to Lebanon. These comments came during a previously unannounced visit to Beirut to discuss the volatile situation with Lebanon’s parliament speaker and caretaker prime minister.
Hochstein is a lobbyist who serves as the Special Presidential Coordinator for Global Infrastructure and Energy Security under Joe Biden. He has a background in Israel and the Middle East. He is a former member of the supervisory board of Ukrainian Naftogaz and was a close advisor to vice president Biden. He served in the Barack Obama administration under Secretaries of State Clinton and Kerry. He is in charge of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve so we’re pessimistic about his levels of commonsense.
Although Ibrahim retired from his official position, he remains the channel to Hezbollah. He has now revealed that Team Obama-Biden’s envoy, Amos Hochstein (who communicated with Hezbollah via Ibrahim in 2022), contacted him shortly after the Oct 7 terrorist attack. 2/ pic.twitter.com/axeF8lyN1l
— Tony Badran (@AcrossTheBay) November 4, 2023
Hochstein is mildy famous for raising a red flag over Hunter Biden’s role with Burisma when in the Obama administration’s State Department, he co-published a 87-page report in 2020 with George Kent, former acting deputy chief of mission at the US Embassy in Kiev. At the time he was a senior State Department official and “raised concerns” to Biden’s staff and directly to Biden. Nothing happened.
He is not universally admired. Hochstein was the driving force behind the maritime border and gas arrangement that was falsely touted as a way to temper Hezbollah’s violence.
Amos Hochstein, Biden's point man on bowing to Hezbollah landed in Beirut today to bow to Hezbollah. Hochstein, (otherwise known as Mr. Haircut), negotiated the maritime border deal on Hezbollah's behalf, forced Israel's interim government to give our territorial and economic…
— Caroline Glick (@CarolineGlick) November 7, 2023
Biden showing his colors
Transcript: Amos Hochstein, Biden’s point man on bowing to Hezbollah landed in Beirut today to bow to Hezbollah. Hochstein, (otherwise known as Mr. Haircut), negotiated the maritime border deal on Hezbollah’s behalf, forced Israel’s interim government to give our territorial and economic waters and a natural gas deposit to Hezbollah a week before our election.
Just before Oct. 7, Mr. Haircut was pressuring Israel to satisfy Hezbollah’s demands for land in the Upper Galilee and Golan Heights. The fact that Hochstein’s back meeting with Hezbollah’s puppet Nabi Berri, the parliament speaker means that the Biden administration is still implementing its Iran First Middle East policy even though Iranian proxies have attacked U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria more than 40 times in the last month and U.S. soldiers are spending every other night in bunkers.