A real friend of Israel would be making it face up to some uncomfortable truths | Haggai Matar

President Biden's visit stopped short of addressing the root causes of this endless cycle of violence - that should be his aim

• Haggai Matar is an Israeli journalist and political activist

President Joe Biden arrived in Tel Aviv on Wednesday with three main goals. He wished to reaffirm his government's complete support for the Israeli government, to repeat the warning to surrounding states against intervening in the Israel-Gaza war, and to ask that his hosts offer some humanitarian relief for Palestinian civilians in the besieged Strip, which they continue to bomb intensely ahead of the planned ground invasion.

Essentially, backed by the American and British aircraft carriers and naval fleets that arrived in the region last week, the short visit has been seen in Israel as a serious endorsement of its campaign, which has already killed more than 3,000 Palestinians, including hundreds of children. Biden was received here as something of a saviour, against the backdrop of the massacres of 7 October and the widespread unpopularity of Benjamin Netanyahu's government, which everyone assumes will collapse the moment the war ends.

Haggai Matar is an Israeli journalist and political activist, and is the executive director of +972 Magazine

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