While the Biden administration has maintained its strong support of Israel’s war aim of eliminating Hamas in Gaza, that support has for weeks been tempered by statements from U.S. officials saying Israel needs to minimize deaths of civilians as it continues fighting.
Those mild rebukes appear to have been ignored by the Israelis. Their continued widespread bombing has raised the death toll in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry, to 18,600. And the growing tension between Biden and Israel’s leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, broke into the open on Dec. 12. Biden warned Israel that it is “losing support” over the war. Netanyahu publicly disagreed with the U.S. goal of having the Palestinian Authority run Gaza.
