‘An Embarrassment to the United States!’ John Bolton Rips Biden to Shreds for Urging Israel Not to Retaliate Against Iran

Former National Security Advisor John Bolton urged Israel to strike back against Iran, and called President Joe Biden an “embarrassment to the United States” for encouraging Israeli restraint.

Iran rained down some 300 drones and missiles on Israel Saturday night, but most were deflected by Israel’s Iron Dome defense system.

CNN’s Clarissa Ward reported that “President Biden has urged Israel not to escalate further, but one Israeli official telling CNN that they will respond, it’s simply a matter of the scale and scope of what that response will be.”

Bolton told CNN’s Jake Tapper that Saturday night’s attack was a “huge failure” of both U.S. and Israeli deterrence.

“Last night, the Iranians launched 320-plus cruise and ballistic missiles and drones,” Bolton said. ” It’s a blessing that the Israelis find only 1% got through, but not every night is going to be that good. And unless Iran sees a powerful response, that risk will continue. And the way to re-establish deterrence is not proportional. That’s academic talk.” Bolton continued:

The way you establish deterrence is by telling your adversary, “If you ever try that again, the price you will pay will be so much higher in any gain you think you can get. You shouldn’t even think about it.” So, I think Israel has a wide range of potential targets. Start by flattening Iran’s air defense capabilities. Next, you might go after headquarters of the regular military and the Revolutionary Guards. You could consider going after their oil infrastructure, the oil fields, the distribution pipelines, the export port facilities.

And most importantly, I think Israel should be looking at this as an opportunity to destroy Iran’s nuclear weapons program, which is the existential threat that Israel faces. I don’t know what they’ll do. I can’t predict it, but I will tell you this: If Joe Biden, as some press reports have it, is urging the Israelis not to retaliate at all, he is an embarrassment to the United States. This is an American interest to make sure that Iran, which is the principal threat to international peace and security in the region, is at a minimum put in its place to spare Israel, to spare the Gulf Arabs, and to spare us from the threat that they pose.

Tapper asked for Bolton’s reaction to former President Donald Trump’s claim that the U.S. has shown “great weakness” in the region, and the Iranian strikes “would not have happened” if he were in office.

“I just think Trump is delusional on this point,” Bolton answered. “It’s a point that nobody can refute or confirm one way or the other. He doesn’t have any idea what to do in the Middle East in this situation.”

Watch the clip above via CNN.