(Washington) US President Joe Biden said he was ready on Wednesday to stop delivering certain weapons to Israel in the event of a major offensive in Rafah, publicly and for the first time setting conditions for American support for its ally.
“If they enter Rafah, I will not deliver to them the weapons that have always been used […] against cities,” he said in an interview with CNN.
“We will not deliver the weapons and artillery shells that have been used” so far, he added, referring to the bombs used by Israel since the start of the war in Gaza in retaliation for the unprecedented attack by Hamas on October 7.
Asked about the US decision to suspend the delivery of a shipment of bombs, he commented: “Civilians have been killed in Gaza because of these bombs,” and added: “It’s wrong.”
According to a senior American official, the United States last week suspended the delivery of a shipment consisting of “1,800 2,000-pound (907 kg) bombs and 1,700 500-pound (226 kg) bombs”, while the Israeli army was preparing to launch a “limited” offensive according to it in Rafah, which some fear as being the prelude to a major assault.
“Population centers”
In doing so, the United States is walking the talk after repeated warnings against any major offensive in the southern Gaza Strip city, where 1.4 million Palestinians have sought refuge, many having fled bombings in the north.
Asked about ongoing operations in Rafah, where the Israeli army has deployed tanks and taken control of a border crossing, Joe Biden said it was not affecting “population centers,” suggesting that , for Washington, this is not the large-scale operation so feared.
“I said it clearly to Bibi (Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu) and to the war cabinet, they will not have our support if they really enter the population centers,” said the American president.
President Biden’s Democratic administration has already taken more modest steps to demonstrate its displeasure with the Israeli prime minister, including imposing sanctions on extremist Israeli settlers, but has so far resisted calls to condition its aid military.
The United States is reviewing additional arms shipments, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Wednesday.
Taken seriously
ISRAELI ARMY PHOTO, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Israeli soldiers in Rafah
The announcement comes at a delicate time for the Biden administration, which is expected to submit a much-anticipated report to Congress this week on whether Israel’s use of U.S. weapons complies with international law and, thereby, respects American law.
“Despite Netanyahu’s rhetoric, Israel takes American pressure very seriously,” said Raphael Cohen of the RAND research center, recalling for example that Israel opened several crossing points in the Gaza Strip under pressure from the United States. United, including recently at Kerem Shalom.
“That said, I think it will be difficult for Netanyahu to completely abandon the operation in Rafah,” said this expert.
Despite international condemnations, the Israeli Prime Minister promised to launch this offensive, which he believes is essential to destroy the last battalions of the Islamist movement in the Palestinian territory.
“Levers”
On a strictly military level, everything depends “on the depth of Israel’s stocks”, which retains a large quantity of bombs, but some of whose stocks have been exhausted by the seven months of war, Raphael Cohen further notes.
With $3 billion annually, the United States is Israel’s main donor of funds and weapons, and even sent a shipment of munitions at the start of the war.
If there is no question for Washington of calling into question long-term security aid, for example for the “Iron Dome” anti-aircraft shield, which demonstrated its formidable effectiveness after the attack on Iran on the 14 April, calls are becoming more and more numerous to condition American military aid.
What’s more, in the middle of an election year in the United States, and while pro-Palestinian demonstrations are shaking many American campuses.
The suspension of bomb deliveries last week is “scandalous,” denounced the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson.
Left-wing senator Bernie Sanders called on the American president to “use all his levers” to put pressure on Israel.