Austin Takes His Lessons Learned and a Harder Message Back to Israel

The Biden administration’s support for Israel and its concerns over the growing number of Palestinian deaths have been emphasized by the U.S. military secretary.

Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III entered the spotlight on Monday after serving as President Biden’s quiet man at the Pentagon for three years. He walked off his plane at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv.

This was his second trip to the area since Israel invaded Gaza in response to the terrorist incident on October 7 that was led by Hamas. Mr. Austin has emphasized the Biden administration’s support for Israel in meetings and chats with Israeli leaders, while also expressing worries about the growing number of Palestinian deaths.

However, his warning has been more direct: if Israel does not take more action to defend civilians, Mr. Austin recently warned, the country may suffer “strategic defeat” that would make it less secure.

Mr. Austin is in a good position to issue the warning. The four-star general, who is retired, offers a plethora of battle and urban warfare knowledge from the military. early American initiatives in 2004 to combat the Taliban and other rebels in Afghanistan. The 2007 Iraqi troop “surge” the strategy to free Mosul, Iraq, from Islamic State control in 2016. All of that involved Mr. Austin.

Taking center stage and disclosing more about himself, the incredibly secretive Mr. Austin is helping the Biden administration handle the Gaza situation.

“You know, from my time fighting in Iraq and leading the campaign to defeat ISIS, I learned a thing or two about urban warfare,” he stated earlier this month during an address at the Reagan National Defense Forum. “Defending civilians is not a strategy that wins urban warfare.” The lesson is that safeguarding civilians is the only way to prevail in urban combat.

Republicans took issue with the military secretary’s apparent lack of support for Israel. The Republican senator from South Carolina, Lindsey Graham, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” the day following the speech that Mr. Austin was “naïve” and that “I’ve just lost all confidence in this guy.”

However, detractors of Israel’s bombing campaign argue that the message is long overdue, with health officials in Gaza reporting that the dead toll is getting close to 20,000.