Netanyahu’s approach to war ‘hurting’ Israel: Biden
31,045 Palestinians have been killed since October 7 in Israel’s military offensive on the Gaza Strip
WASHINGTON/GAZA STRIP: Joe Biden said Benjamin Netanyahu’s approach to the war in Gaza was “hurting Israel more than helping Israel” in an interview aired on Saturday, as the US leader’s impatience with his Israeli counterpart grows increasingly visible.
With Gaza’s humanitarian crisis growing more dire and Biden’s left flank in uproar, the US president made contradictory remarks as to the question of a “red line” over Israel’s threatened offensive on Rafah in southern Gaza.
Netanyahu “has a right to defend Israel, a right to continue to pursue Hamas,” Biden said, but added that “he must pay more attention to the innocent lives being lost as a consequence of the actions taken”.
“In my view he is hurting Israel more than helping Israel,” he said.
As to Israel’s potential invasion of Rafah, where some 1.5 million of the territory’s 2.4 million residents are now crammed, Biden was ambiguous.
“It is a red line,” the 81-yearold Democrat said, immediately adding: “I am never going to leave Israel. The defence of Israel is still critical.
“There is no red line (in which) I want to cut off all weapons so they don’t have the Iron Dome (air defense system) to protect them.”
He then once again countered that there were in fact “red lines... You cannot have 30,000 more Palestinians dead.”
At least 31,045 Palestinians have been killed and 72,654 have been wounded since October 7 in Israel’s military offensive on the Gaza Strip, the enclave’s health ministry said on Sunday.
Israel-Hamas war rages in besieged Gaza
Deadly fighting raged on in Gaza on Sunday, with no truce in sight on the eve of the Muslim holy month of Ramzan and a dire humanitarian crisis gripping the besieged Palestinian territory.
A Spanish charity ship carrying food aid was expected to soon set sail from the Mediterranean island-nation of Cyprus to help alleviate the suffering in the coastal Gaza Strip, now in its sixth month of war.
The non-governmental group Open Arms said its boat would carry 200 tonnes of food, which its partner the US charity World Central Kitchen would then unload on the shores of Gaza where it had constructed a basic dock.
As famine looms in parts of besieged Gaza, US, Jordanian and other planes have also airdropped food aid there, but UN agencies warn this falls far short of the needs of its 2.4 million people.
Weeks of talks involving US, Qatari and Egyptian mediators have aimed for a six-week truce and the release of many of the about 100 hostages Hamas is still holding in return for Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails, with no result so far.
The widely shared target had been to halt the fighting by the start of Ramzan, which is expected to begin on Monday depending on the first sighting of the crescent moon.
Both sides have blamed each other for failing to reach a ceasefire deal so far, after Israel had demanded a full list of surviving hostages, and Hamas had called for Israel to pull out all its troops from Gaza.
Israel’s government accused Hamas of “entrenching its positions like someone who is not interested in a deal and is striving to inflame the region during Ramzan”.
US, UK, French military shoot down Houthi drones
US, French and British forces downed dozens of drones in the Red Sea area overnight and on Saturday after Yemen’s Iranaligned Houthis targeted bulk carrier Propel Fortune and US destroyers in the region, the US military said in a statement.
The Houthis have been attacking ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden since November in what they say is a campaign of solidarity with Palestinians. The group’s military spokesman Yahya Sarea said in a televised speech on Saturday they had targeted the cargo vessel and “a number of US war destroyers at the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden with 37 drones”.