Biden faces pivotal moment as he weighs retaliation for soldier deaths in Jordan drone strike
As early as tonight, President Joe Biden will authorise US military action in the Middle East.
It is likely to be one of the most consequential decisions of his presidency.
At stake, the credibility of American deterrence and the teetering stability of the region.
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Ever since the game-changing Hamas attacks on Israel last October, this always volatile part of the world has seemed on the brink of a much larger conflict.
The American president will hope his choice in the coming hours will deter any such escalation. It may do the opposite.
America’s enemies have crossed a line: Inaction is not an option, but over-reacting could light the tinderbox of Middle East tensions and ignite a regional war.
For weeks, Iranian-backed militia have been launching attacks on US assets without inflicting casualties.
That changed when a drone penetrated defences at a desert base in Jordan and reached a tent full of sleeping American soldiers.
Three are dead and more than 40 injured in the attack – blamed on a militia group with close ties to Iran.
The Tower 22 base where the soldiers were killed. Pic: Planet Labs PBC via AP
Biden will try to calibrate so his response punishes and deters, but doesn’t escalate. Pic: AP
In the hours since, President Biden will have been given a range of options by his military advisers ranging from the symbolic to the severely punitive.
He could attack the group responsible, but that will seen by many back home as weak and not striking the heart of the problem: the group’s patrons in Iran.
Also on the Pentagon’s list of options, action against the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps in the region outside Iran or, attacking Iranian assets within its borders.
Biden will not just be weighing geopolitical factors but domestic political considerations too.
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His Republican rivals are baying for attacks on Iran itself. He cannot afford to look weak in an election year.
But another costly foreign war could hurt his chances of re-election too. Damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t.
Ever since tensions were ignited by the Hamas atrocities of 7 October and Israel’s response, there has been fear of widening conflict in the Middle East.
The president will try to calibrate his response so it punishes and deters but does not escalate.
But war is not a precise science.
If US military action is disproportionately destructive it will demand a stronger response from Iran. A cycle of escalation will ensue.
Confrontation has been ratcheting up in the air, on land and at sea.
US and British airstrikes have followed attacks by other Iranian proxies, the Houthis, in the Red Sea. Attacks on US assets on the ground in Syria, Iraq and Jordan have intensified.
It is still assumed no one wants a much bigger war but events at some point may soon acquire an irreversible momentum, tipping the region into one.
That danger is far from receding, a moment of no return seems to be approaching with each passing day.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
A farmer who fell from a greenhouse roof during an anti-immigrant raid at a licensed cannabis facility in California this week has died of his injuries.
Jaime Alanis, 57, is the first person to die as a result of Donald Trump’s Immigration Compliance and Enforcement (ICE) raids.
His niece, Yesenia Duran, posted on the fundraising site GoFundMe to say her uncle was his family’s only provider and he had been sending his earnings back to his wife and daughter in Mexico.
The United Food Workers said Mr Alanis had worked on the farm for 10 years.
“These violent and cruel federal actions terrorise American communities, disrupt the American food supply chain, threaten lives and separate families,” the union said in a recent statement on X.
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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said it executed criminal search warrants at Glass House Farms facilities on Thursday.
Mr Alanis called family to say he was hiding and possibly fleeing agents before he fell around 30ft (9m) from the roof and broke his neck, according to information from family, hospital and government sources.
Agents arrested 200 people suspected of being in the country illegally and identified at least 10 immigrant children on the sites, the DHS said in a statement.
Mr Alanis was not among them, the agency said.
“This man was not in and has not been in CBP (Customs and Border Protection) or ICE custody,” DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin said.
“Although he was not being pursued by law enforcement, this individual climbed up to the roof of a greenhouse and fell 30ft. CBP immediately called a medivac to the scene to get him care as quickly as possible.”
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Four US citizens were arrested during the incident for allegedly “assaulting or resisting officers”, the DHS said, and authorities were offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of a person suspected of firing a gun at federal agents.
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In a statement, Glass House, a licensed Cannabis grower, said immigration agents had valid warrants. It said workers were detained and it is helping provide them with legal representation.
“Glass House has never knowingly violated applicable hiring practices and does not and has never employed minors,” it added.
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