Politicians in the US on Sunday intensified their denunciation of Israel for its conduct in Gazawith a prominent Democratic senator accusing the main American ally of “strategic and moral errors” – and Secretary of State, Anthony Blinkensaying he was testing the limits of international law.
In an interview with CNN’s State of the Union program, the Connecticut Democrat Chris Murphymember of the Senate foreign relations committee, warned that Hamas would likely become stronger if Israel waged a all-out attack on Rafah.
“I want Hamas to disappear,” Murphy said. “I don’t want them to have the ability to attack Israel again. [But] I worry that the number of civilians who are dying will ultimately provide Hamas with permanent recruiting material and pose a threat for years to come.
“We cannot allow an invasion of Rafah that ends with the deaths of tens of thousands of additional civilians. This will be bad for Israel from a moral and strategic point of view.”
He continued: “So I am certainly willing to denounce Israel when I think they have made strategic and moral mistakes in this war. We should [also] to be calling out Hamas for the attacks that started this war, for the way they violated the rules of engagement and for the fact that the quickest way to end this war is for Hamas to surrender and protect the people of Gaza.”
Murphy’s comments were some of the strongest criticism ever made by a centrist U.S. politician against Israel, which Gaza’s Health Ministry said on Sunday had killed more than 35,000 people in attacks since the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas.
Stronger condemnation came from Vermont Democratic Senator Bernie Sanders, a member of the party’s progressive wing.
“Any objective observer knows that Israel has violated international law… has violated American law – and in my opinion, Israel should not receive another penny in U.S. military aid,” he told NBC’s Meet the Press, adding that Hamas it was “a terrible, disgusting terrorist organization that started this war.”
About that, BlinkHis comment was considerably more measured. In an interview with CBS’ Face the Nation, the top diplomat in Joe Biden’s White House said it is “reasonable to assess that in certain cases Israel has acted in ways that are not consistent” with international humanitarian law.
Blinken’s comments on Sunday came after Biden threatened stop supplying weapons to Israel if Rafah was invaded. This came as the White House said the US had halted the transfer of 3,500 “dumb” high-payload bombs due to concerns about the rising number of civilian casualties in Gaza.
Blinken stopped short of explicitly accusing Israel of violating international law as it continued its offensive against the Palestinian militant group Hamas. He said it was “critical” to note that Israel itself has accountability processes – and there have been hundreds of active inquiries as well as criminal investigations into different incidents, showing that Israel had “the ability, the means and the actions to self-correct.” .
“It was very difficult to determine, especially in the midst of war, exactly what happened and draw final conclusions from any incident,” he said, adding that the US was avoiding any firm assessment of a potential breach because Hamas “hides behind and beneath civilian populations, in schools and hospitals.”
Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas later dismissed Blinken’s “reasonable to evaluate” rhetoric as “some magical talisman” to help Democrats toe a political line within the party. He criticized the Biden administration for imposing a “de facto arms embargo” on Israel.
The administration’s national security policy, Cotton continued, “looks like a bunch of evasive, foul-mouthed politics.”
Last week, the US released a 46-page unclassified report concluding that – despite American concerns – Israel had offered credible assurances that it was not violating US law or intentionally.
The conclusions of that report were completely at odds with the assessments of the UN and major international aid groups. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs last week estimated the number of victims of the attacks in Gaza at 34,844, of which 7,797 (32%) were children and 4,959 (20%) were women.
Israel attacked Gaza in response to the October 7 attack that killed 1,100 people, mostly civilians, while taking hostages.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reacted defiantly, saying his country’s military would continue with its plan to enter Rafah.
On Sunday, Blinken reiterated that the US made it clear to the Israeli government that it would not support a major operation in Rafah, where 1.4 million people are sheltering, in the absence of a credible plan to protect civilians.
The Secretary of State said the US was not stopping the transfer of US weapons to Israel beyond the 3,500 bombs that had already been withheld.
“We have made clear that if Israel launches this major military operation in Rafah, there are certain systems that we will not support and provide for that operation,” Blinken said.
But Blinken said the Biden administration has not ruled out supplying high-payload munitions, including 1,800 bombs each weighing 2,000 pounds and 1,700 bombs each weighing 500 pounds. “We are in active conversation with Israel about this,” he said. “We have real concerns about how they are used.”
Murphy insisted that Biden was “being a good leader” by retaining previous weapons.
“The large central part of the country wants to support Israel’s ability to destroy Hamas, but is very concerned about the fact that there are so many children dying – that over the last week there has been no humanitarian assistance coming into the country,” he said.
He said it would be better for Israel to embrace the leadership of the Palestinian Authority to build a “transitional government structure” inside Gaza, given intelligence agencies’ conclusion that it would be virtually impossible to fully eradicate Hamas.
“There will continue to be a resistance movement against the State of Israel, and the question is: will it be weaker or stronger after 13,000 to 15,000 children are killed inside Gaza?” he said.
“My argument is that right now the outlook is that they will simply get stronger.”
Blinken appeared to share those concerns, saying: “There has to be a clear and credible plan to protect civilians, which we have not seen. And we have to see a plan for what happens after this conflict in Gaza is over, and we haven’t seen that yet.”
