Amid controversy about President Joe Biden's recent stance on the conflict in the Middle East, two Republican lawmakers are calling for unconditional US support for Israel in a bid to battle Tehran’s regional proxies.
Tensions between US President Joe Biden and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu have been deepening as Biden threatens to limit military support for the Jewish state in an attempt to reduce casualties in Gaza amid a humanitarian crisis.
August Pfluger, representative for Texas and a former Air Force F-22 fighter pilot, and Don Davis, representative for North Carolina and an Air Force veteran, wrote in the Washington Examiner that not only is Israel facing an existential struggle against Hamas, whose foundational charter calls for killing Jews and destroying Israel, "our ally is also confronting Iran’s region-wide network of terrorist proxies that attack Israeli civilians, US troops, and commercial shipping vessels".
They said: “In response, we should not only stand beside our partner as Israel defends itself against threats on multiple fronts, but we should also recognize that Israel’s victory against terrorism will be a victory against America’s adversaries and that we therefore must do our utmost to ensure Israel has everything it needs to prevail in this conflict.”
On October 7, Hamas, long backed by Tehran, invaded Israel, killing 1,200 mostly civilians and taking more than 250 hostage in the single most deadly day for Jews since the Holocaust.
Military veterans Pfluger and Davis noted the scores of attacks on US facilities around the Middle East which have followed the outbreak of the Gaza war in Iraq, Syria and more recently, on the Red Sea, punishment for its stance supporting Israel’s right to defend itself in the wake of October 7.
“America must stand beside its partners when they face barbaric attacks, especially when they are fighting enemies, such as Iran’s terrorist network, who are also intent on harming Americans.” Just weeks ago, three US troops were killed by Iranian-backed militia in Jordan as actions against US forces continue to pose deeper risks to troops in the region.
Israel’s response to the Hamas invasion, celebrated by the Iranian regime just hours after the attacks in spite of Tehran’s distancing itself from the operation, has led to what Hamas’s health ministry claims is over 30,000 deaths and aid groups say the strip is on the brink of starvation.
“It is Hamas, not Israel, that bears ultimate responsibility for the suffering and death in Gaza,” the military experts said. “The terrorist group has diverted a vast amount of humanitarian assistance meant for civilians to fuel its own war effort and enrich its leaders instead. It has fired at Palestinian civilians in Gaza fleeing the conflict zone. It hides terrorists and weapons around, in, and under homes, schools, mosques, and hospitals. The use of human shields is not only a war crime but also a cynical ploy.”
It is US support which allows Israel to conduct precise operations, the pair said, using the likes of US-provided precision-guided missiles for its surgical strikes, in addition to the life-saving interceptors for Israel’s Iron Dome missile interceptor system which has protected Israel from most of the 11,000 or more rockets rained down by Hamas, mostly provided by Iran.
“If cuts or conditions on US aid deprived Israel of either of these important munitions, there would only be more, not fewer, civilian casualties — on both sides … Unable to defend against these barrages, Israel would have no choice but to move aggressively and swiftly into all of Gaza to eliminate the launchers.
“Without PGMs, Israel would have to resort to not only using “dumb” bombs but would also have to drop more bombs than it currently does. The result would be far greater devastation of Gaza.”
This week, the US decision not to veto a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire, has caused deeper rifts between the two countries, as the US election race heats up, the pressure from Democrats to ease support for Israel weighing heavy on the President.
Netanyahu immediately rejected the resolution’s demands, saying that the war aims continue. “Israel will pursue and achieve its just war objectives: Destroying Hamas's military and governmental capacities, release of all the hostages, and ensuring Gaza will not pose a threat to the people of Israel in the future,” he said on Tuesday.
The resolution also failed to address the issue of the more than 130 hostages still in Gaza. “Regrettably, the United States did not veto the new resolution, which calls for a ceasefire that is not contingent on the release of hostages,” the Prime Minister’s office said.
“This constitutes a clear departure from the consistent US position in the Security Council since the beginning of the war … [the] resolution gives Hamas hope that international pressure will force Israel to accept a ceasefire without the release of our hostages, thus harming both the war effort and the effort to release the hostages.”
In Biden’s presidential race, he had called proposals to condition aid “a gigantic mistake” and an “absolutely outrageous” idea. “He was right then, and he would be right now to reject attaching any strings to assistance for our strongest ally in the Middle East,” concluded the military vets.
