Israel is losing international support due to its “indiscriminate bombing” of Gaza, US President Joe Biden said, issuing his most scathing critique of Israel since the start of the war and calling for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to switch out his coalition partners.
“Israel’s security can rest on the United States,” Biden stated during a campaign event Tuesday, as he touted his government’s strong support of Israel.
Right now, however, Israel has wider support than just the US, Biden explained, as he pointed to the European Union and the international community which has also backed the Jewish state in the aftermath of Hamas’ October 7 attack.
“But they’re starting to lose that support by the indiscriminate bombing that takes place” in Gaza, Biden said, in a statement that implied Israel was needlessly targeting civilians.
Speculation is high that Biden will ask Israel to constrain its military campaign to oust Hamas from Gaza as attention in Washington is redirected to the 2024 run for the White House within in a geo-political atmosphere of low Democratic support for the Gaza war.
In the first flush of shock at the Hamas atrocities on October 7, including the terror group’s killing of over 1,200 people and seizing some 250 hostages, Biden visited Israel in solidarity.
He has remained staunch in his support providing military and financial aid. The US will “do everything in our power to hold Hamas accountable — every single thing in our power. They’re animals. They exceeded anything that any other terrorist group has done,” Biden said on Tuesday.
But Biden has become increasingly vocal about the importance of Israel maintaining a low civilian casualty count and ensuring the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza. Hamas has assured that over 18,200 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in war-related violence, with Israel insisting that at least 7,000 of those are combatants.
During the campaign event, Biden explained that Israel has put forward the argument that its casualty count was not unusual for wars in which one faced a brutal enemy, drawing a comparison between its battle with Hamas and the Allied force’s war against Germany and Japan in World War II.
“It was pointed out to me — I’m being very blunt with you all — it was pointed out to me that — by Bibi — that “Well, you carpet-bombed Germany. You dropped the Atomic bomb. A lot of civilians died,” Biden said as he recounted his conversation with Netanyahu.
“I said, “Yeah, that’s why all these institutions were set up after World War Two to see to it that it didn’t happen again,” Biden recalled.
He cautioned Israel not to make the same mistake the US did the aftermath of the Al-Qaeda attack on the Twin Towers on September 11, 2001.
‘There was no reason why we had to do some of the things we did” in that US military campaign against Al-Qaeda, Biden said.
The disagreement with Israel about strategy for its war against Hamas, a campaign that the US supports, also extends to the vision both he and Netanyahu have for the day after the war ends, Biden stated.
He wants to see movement toward a two-state resolution to the conflict whereas many within Netanyahu’s Likud party and his larger coalition oppose one. Netanyahu has also insisted that the PA can not rule Gaza and that the enclave of 2.3 million Palestinians must remain under IDF control.
‘This government in Israel is making it very difficult’
“Israel has a tough decision to make. Bibi has got a tough decision to make. There’s no question about the need to take on Hamas. There’s no question about that. None. Zero. They have every right,” Biden said.
“This government in Israel is making it very difficult for him to move” forward, so “I think he has to change .. this government,” Biden added. “This is the most conservative government in Israel’s history — the most conservative. I’ve known every, every single head of state in Israel since Golda Meir. And I’ve known them because I’ve spent time with them.”
He highlighted in particular National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir of the Otzma Yehudi party, explaining that those in the government now are a “different group” then previous coalitions.
“Ben-Gvir and company and the new folks, they — they don’t want anything remotely approaching a two-state solution. They not only want to have retribution” but “they don’t want a two-state solution. They don’t want any- — anything having to with the — the Palestinians.,” Biden said.
He acknowledged that the Palestinians have not done a good job at governance and that “a lot has happened that’s very negative” but that this does not absolve Israel of the obligation to move forward with a two-state resolution to the conflict.
“We have to work toward bringing Israel together in a way that provides for the beginning of option — an option of a two-state,” he said. Such a move is important if Israel wants to advance its regional ties such as with Saudi Arabia.
In the interim, the US will continue to protect Israel, because without a Jewish state no Jews in the world is safe, Biden explained.
Netanyahu pushed back at US plans to place a reformed Palestinian Authority in Gaza once Israel’s military campaign to oust Gaza is finished.
“Gaza will be neither Hamastan nor Fatahstan,” he said on Tuesday.
Netanyahu thanked the Biden administration. “I greatly appreciate the American support for destroying Hamas and returning our hostages.
“Following an intensive dialogue with President Biden and his team, we received full backing for the ground incursion and blocking the international pressure to stop the war,” Netanyahu said.
“Yes, there is disagreement about ‘the day after Hamas’ and I hope that we will reach an agreement here as well,” he explained.
“I would like to clarify my position: I will not allow Israel to repeat the mistake of Oslo,” Netanyahu said as he pointed to the 1993 Accord that one year later allowed for the creation of the governing body called the Palestinian Authority.
The PA governs Areas A and B of the West Bank and until 2007 it also operated in Gaza, but Hamas drove it out of the enclave in a bloody coup. This followed Israel’s withdrawal of its army from Gaza and its destruction of 21 settlements there in 2005.
Netanyahu has explained that Hamas can not govern Gaza after the war, but neither can the PA, particularly in light of its policy of providing monthly financial stipends to terrorists and their families.
“After the great sacrifice of our civilians and our soldiers, I will not allow the entry into Gaza of those who educate for terrorism, support terrorism and finance terrorism,” Netanyahu said.
Jake Sullivan expected to visit Israel
US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan who is expected to visit Israel this week, spoke about the day after the Gaza war at a virtual Wall Street Journal event.
“We have been clear that we believe that re-occupation of Gaza is a bad idea. It should not happen and the Israeli government understands that as well,” he said.
Sullivan said “There has to be an interim security arrangement,” as efforts continue for a longer-term political solution for Gaza and the West Bank. Those two regions have to be connected under a revamped and revitalized Palestinian Authority, he added.
It’s hard to envision a revamped PA that could have the confidence of the Palestinian people, he said. “What can be hard to envision today can become reality tomorrow,” he explained.
He also discussed the timetable for the Gaza war, just as the United Nations General Assembly called for a ceasefire. The US opposed the resolution, but I that been concerned about the timetable of the IDF’s military campaign.
“The subject of how they are seeing the timetable of this war will certainly be on the agenda for my meetings,” Sullivan said during a public interview at a Wall Street Journal event Tuesday morning.
“I also believe that high-intensity military operations of the kind we have seen over the past several weeks it does not have to be that you go from that to literarily nothing,” Sullivan said.
He described a scenario in which Israel could shift into a different stage of the conflict, in which the fighting would be more contained.
Israel could still “go after Hamas leadership” and “targets” or continue “to have tools in your toolbox to try and secure the release of hostages. It just means that you move to a different phase from the kind of high-intensity operations that we see today.”
IDF Spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said that the army worked closely with their US security counterparts as he downplayed reports of tension between the US and Israelis on the timeline. Pentagon Press Secretary Pat Ryder also spoke of the US military’s backing of the IDF’s Gaza campaign.
Ryder cautioned, however, that protecting Palestinian civilians was a “strategic imperative.”
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