President Joe Biden said for the first time on Wednesday (8) that he would suspend some shipments of American weapons to Israel – which he acknowledged have been used to kill civilians in Gaza – if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a major invasion of the city of Rafah.
“Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of these bombs and other ways they attack population centers,” Biden told Erin Burnett of CNN in an exclusive interview.
The president’s announcement that he was prepared to condition American armaments on Israel’s actions represents a turning point in the seven-month conflict between Israel and Hamas. And his acknowledgment that American bombs have been used to kill civilians in Gaza was an absolute recognition of the United States’ role in the war.
The president has been under extraordinary pressure, including from members of his own party, to limit arms shipments amid a humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
So far, the president has resisted these calls and strongly supported Israel’s efforts to pursue Hamas. However, an imminent invasion of Rafah, the city in southern Gaza where more than a million Palestinian civilians have taken shelter, seems to have changed the president’s calculations.
“We are not stepping away from Israel’s security. We are stepping away from Israel’s ability to wage war in these areas,” Biden said.
Biden stated that while the U.S. would continue to provide defensive weapons to Israel, including for its ‘Iron Dome’ air defense system, other shipments would end if a major ground invasion in Rafah began.
The U.S. has already halted a shipment of “large payload munitions” due to possible Israeli operations in Rafah without a plan for the civilians sheltering there, according to the Pentagon, although it has stated that a final decision on that shipment has not yet been made.
Israeli officials expressed to U.S. authorities “deep frustration” with the pause in shipments, as well as with U.S. media statements about the decision, according to a source familiar with the matter.
Source: CNN