The White House is reportedly weighing using its weapons sales to Israel as a bargaining chip to try to de-escalate the Gaza conflict — while Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu claims the war is going “better than many expected.”
President Biden’s team recently directed Pentagon officials to review the additional US weaponry requested by Israel to see if it might be used to pressure the Jewish country to scale back its war against Palestinian Gaza, NBC reported Sunday, citing three current US officials and one former American one.
The White House responded later Sunday by saying there has been no change “in our policy.
“Israel has a right and obligation to defend themselves against the threat of Hamas, while abiding by international humanitarian law and protecting civilian lives, and we remain committed to support Israel in its fight against Hamas,” the White House National Security Council said in a statement.
“We have done so since Oct. 7, and will continue to. There has not been a change in our policy,” the council added, referring to the October slaughter of more than 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in Israel by the Palestinian terror group Hamas, a massacre that sparked the war.
But the NBC sources claim that the Biden administration has considered slowing or pausing the deliveries of weapons being sought by Israel.
Among the weaponry are 155 mm artillery rounds and Joint Direct Attack Munitions, which are used for precise aerial strikes in Gaza, the sources said.
The idea to pressure Israel with the weapons came as the death toll in Gaza surpassed 26,000 on Friday, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health, which does not differentiate between civilians and terrorists.
Biden and other US officials have repeatedly expressed concerns over the high civilian death toll — worries that were reignited after reports of Israeli airstrikes hitting a refugee shelter in Khan Younis last week.
The Israel-Hamas war has spanned for nearly four months, with the IDF recently decreasing its ground forces after taking control of half of Gaza.
Heavy airstrikes continue to fall over southern Gaza, where hundreds of thousands had fled to.
Biden has also taken hits from his political base over the war, as many Democrats have criticized the sale of US arms to Israel in the conflict.
Even Netanyahu has acknowledged the rift between himself and Biden, but the Israeli prime minister noted Sunday that the agreed-upon goal of the war remains the same.
“We agree on the war aim of destroying Hamas,” Netanyahu told the Wall Street Journal. “That doesn’t mean we haven’t had differences of opinion, but we have worked to overcome them.”
The Hamas-run ministry of health estimates the death toll at more than 26,000, but it does not differentiate between civilian and terrorist.
People inspect a building in Rafah destroyed by an Israeli airstrike on Saturday.
Asked how the war was going, he replied, “Better than many expected.”
Netanyahu compared the war against Hamas to America’s war against the Islamic State terror group, noting that “it took the US and its allies nine months to defeat radical forces in Mosul” in Iraq.
“Mosul is smaller than Gaza and did not have the massive terror underground infrastructure,” Netanyahu added. “We’re now in the fourth month, but we’ve had tough days.”
Despite American intelligence estimating that less than a third of Hamas’ forces have been killed, with many destroyed cells resurging once the IDF moves on, Netanyahu believes the war is progressing in Israel’s favor.
But what happens next continues to be muddied as America favors a two-state solution where Gaza is governed by a reformed Palestinian Authority, while Netanyahu suggested that peace will remain elusive because of Palestinians.
“[My colleagues] understand that the problem is that the Palestinians don’t want peace with Israel but peace without Israel,” he claimed. “There has been a persistent opposition among Palestinian leaders to the very existence of the state of Israel.”
With no end to the war in sight, negotiations over the release of the more than 130 hostages in Gaza also remain up in the air.
Netanyahu said a summit in Paris to discuss a possible hostage release deal and temporary cease-fire with Hamas ended Sunday afternoon without reaching a consensus.
“A short time ago, the intelligence summit in Europe ended with the participation of Mossad head David Barnea, Shin Bet chief Ronan Bar, and reservist colonel Nitzan Alon with the head of the CIA, the prime minister of Qatar, and the Egyptian minister of intelligence,” the prime minister’s office said in a statement.
“The meeting was defined as a constructive meeting. There are still significant gaps in which the parties will continue to discuss this week in additional mutual meetings,” the office added.
While Hamas and Israel appear to agree on a temporary truce to exchange hostages for Palestinian prisoners, the Jewish state has repeatedly rejected the terror groups’ demand for the freedom of all prisoners and Israel’s exit from Gaza.
