Biden’s closest allies step up pressure for an increase in aid provided to Gaza
WASHINGTON — More of President Joe Biden’s allies are demanding the U.S. act directly to ease Palestinian civilian suffering in Gaza and are joining calls to cut military aid if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refuses to change course.
What had been dissent from Sen. Bernie Sanders and a small group of progressive Democrats has swelled in response to the soaring death toll in Gaza. Now even Biden’s closest confidant in Congress, Chris Coons, says it is time to get tougher with Netanyahu’s government.
Israel continues to enjoy support in Congress, and the prospect of military aid being reduced is uncertain despite the clout these mainstream Democrats wield. But tensions could be evident Thursday as Biden speaks to Congress about the conflict in his State of the Union address.
The war in Gaza isn’t the only Mideast issue creating dissent within the party. Some Democrats are pursuing legislation to make the administration seek permission to continue military strikes against the Houthis in Yemen, setting up a possible showdown over the authority to wage war. The Houthis are attacking shipping in the Red Sea in what they say is a show of support for Palestinians during the nearly five-month war in Gaza.
Still, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Democratic caucus as a whole have largely held off on taking action on the U.S. role in the Middle East conflicts. That’s despite growing concern — and rising political opposition nationally, especially among Muslim and Arab American voters — over the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza, and over Netanyahu’s perceived shrugging off of U.S. demands to do more to spare Palestinian civilians and to allow in more aid.
Congressional Democrats are reluctant to be seen as challenging the Democratic president’s handling of the conflict, mindful that criticism could further weaken Biden in his uphill reelection campaign against former President Donald Trump.
The killings of more than 100 Palestinians last week during a rare delivery of food helped spur more Biden allies in the Senate to speak out. Israel says its forces fired warning shots amid the chaos of the aid delivery. Witnesses and medical workers told The Associated Press many of the victims were shot when Israeli forces fired into crowds of hungry people.
In the last few days alone, Coons, a senator from Biden’s home state of Delaware, called for the U.S. to cut military aid to Israel if Netanyahu goes ahead with a threatened offensive on the southern city of Rafah without significant provisions to protect the more than 1 million civilians sheltering there. Sen. Jack Reed, head of the Senate Armed Services Committee, appealed to Biden to deploy the U.S. Navy to get humanitarian aid to Gaza. Biden ally Sen. Tim Kaine challenged the U.S. strikes on the Houthis as unlikely to stop the Red Sea attacks. And the most senior Democrat in the Senate called for Israel to “change course.”