While raising the tone of its criticism of Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet and passing a Security Council resolution demanding a ceasefire in Gaza during Ramadan, Joe Biden’s administration last week authorized sending more military aid to Israel, according to an exclusive from The Washington Post published this Friday. He did it secretly, without giving public explanations, and using prior authorization dating back to 2008, so it did not require a vote in Congress again.
Specifically, Biden has approved the shipment of more than 1,800 one-ton MK84 bombs and 500 250-kilogram MK82 bombs, as well as 25 F-35 fighters, as anonymous administration sources have confirmed to the Post. The MK84 type bombs, prohibited in densely populated areas by international law, have caused numerous fatalities throughout Israel’s military offensive in Gaza, which began after the Hamas attacks on October 7, which left some 1,200 dead. .
Since then, the Netanyahu-led war cabinet’s campaign has claimed more than 32,000 Palestinian lives in Gaza, prompting dismay from the international community and warnings from its biggest ally, the United States. Biden has been expressing his concern for weeks about Israel’s plans to invade Rafah, south of Gaza, and the blockade of humanitarian aid by land, which has forced his administration to explore air and sea routes to send supplies. .
But public differences have not been a brake on military support, which remains unconditional. The package approved this week adds to the annual aid that the Jewish state already receives from the American state, of 3.8 billion dollars, which has been increasing throughout this century. The Washington Post estimates the cost of the new fighters at about $2.5 billion and does not give a price for the bombs. They are part of a package approved in Congress in 2008 that had not been sent in its entirety.
Washington’s support for Tel Aviv, which has historically enjoyed a broad consensus between Democrats and Republicans, is recently being questioned among progressive legislators and among the general population, especially citizens of Arab origin and young people. Israel’s actions, justified from the beginning as revenge for the brutal attacks by Hamas, have left the United States alone in its support of the Middle Eastern country on the international stage.
Democratic senator and former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has responded to the news with criticism of the Biden administration: “The US cannot beg Netanyahu to stop bombing civilians one day and the next send him thousands of 1,000-ton bombs that They can level entire city blocks.
The situation in Gaza is weakening internal support for Biden in this election year, in which he has suffered protest votes in the primaries of states with the greatest Arab presence, such as Minnesota (where 18% voted blank), Michigan (13 .2%) or North Carolina (12%).
Although the Biden administration continues to justify the shipment of weapons with “Israel’s right to defend itself,” the president has publicly expressed concern about the increase in civilian casualties in Gaza. Regarding the plan to invade Rafah, he said it would be a “red line” for his government. And, after vetoing four Security Council resolutions calling for a ceasefire, he finally abstained in the fifth vote this Monday, which called for an “immediate ceasefire” between Israel and Hamas, but temporary, only during the month of Ramadan. .
That angered the Israeli war cabinet, and Netanyahu canceled an announced visit by his advisers to Washington. Throughout this week, the White House has tried to convince the Israeli authorities to reschedule said meeting, something to which they have agreed, as confirmed by the Biden government. The objective of the meeting, Washington assures, is to discuss “alternatives” to the ground offensive in Rafah, where some 1.2 million people are currently gathered, including four Hamas battalions, according to US figures.
This week, there was another meeting at the Pentagon between Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and his team with his American counterpart, Lloyd Austin, where Gallant requested more weapons from the US. After the meeting, General Charles Brown Jr ., head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, assured that, although Israel is asking for weapons in all bilateral meetings, “it has not received everything it has asked for.”
