October 3, 2024 | FDD Tracker: September 7, 2024-October 3, 2024

Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker: October

October 3, 2024 | FDD Tracker: September 7, 2024-October 3, 2024

Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker: October

Trend Overview

Welcome back to the Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker. Once a month, we ask FDD’s experts and scholars to assess the administration’s foreign policy. They provide trendlines of very positive, positive, neutral, negative, or very negative for the areas they watch.

Israel took matters into its own hands to address the Hezbollah threat and enable its internally displaced citizens to return to their homes. Following airstrikes and covert operations that devastated Hezbollah’s leadership and military capabilities, Israeli forces launched a limited ground invasion in southern Lebanon. Iran, meanwhile, has appeared powerless to protect its chief regional proxy. A retaliatory barrage of Iranian ballistic missiles largely failed to hurt the Jewish state, which received U.S. assistance in downing the missiles. Jerusalem has vowed to strike back against Iran, whose military is ill equipped for further confrontation with Israel. The Biden administration has continued to express support for Israel’s right to self-defense while pushing for restraint and de-escalation.

During a visit to the United States, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy presented his “victory plan” to President Joe Biden and both presidential candidates. Amid growing pressure to seek peace talks and uncertainty regarding future U.S. assistance, Kyiv wants its Western backers to surge support in the coming months, strengthening Ukraine’s hand. Zelenskyy left Washington with pledges for additional U.S. aid but without consensus on some key questions, including the matter of long-range strikes in Russia. One gets the sense that America’s Ukraine strategy remains adrift.

Check back next month to see how the administration deals with these and other challenges.

Disclaimer

The analyses above do not necessarily represent the institutional views of FDD.