The US and Israel have had disagreements over Gaza before
U.S.-Israeli Relations Revisited: 60 Years after the First War between the United States and the Arab World – What Does the US Do?
Israel’s military operations there have drawn criticism from the White House before, and it’s not the first time.
The year was 60 years ago. Israel, Britain and France invaded Egyptian territory in a bid to seize the canal and Egypt decided to nationalize it.
U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower stepped in, ending the brief conflict. But in the months afterward, Israel resisted a United Nations resolution that called for it to pull its troops out of the Gaza Strip, then controlled by Egypt.
“Repeated, but so far unsuccessful, efforts have been made to bring about a voluntary withdrawal by Israel,” Eisenhower said in a nationally televised speech. We were disappointed that the government of Israel was still unwilling to withdraw even after the UN action.
The current moment includes this paradox. The U.S. is the leading recipient of military assistance to Israel, according to Biden’s proposal. Yet the president is criticizing Israel’s military operations and telling the country what not to do in Gaza.
“They agreed that they share the objective to see Hamas defeated in Rafah. The U.S. side was worried about various courses of action in Rafah. The US and Israel said in a joint statement that they agreed to take the concerns into account.
“I do see a very, very real risk for the state of Israel and its long-term interests,” said Jeremy Ben-Ami, the head of J Street, a Washington group that describes itself as pro-Israel, pro-peace and pro-democracy.
During his many years in power, Netanyahu has aligned himself with Republicans in the U.S. He has waged very public battles with the past three Democratic presidents: Bill Clinton over peace negotiations with the Palestinians; Barack Obama over a nuclear deal with Iran; and now Biden over the war in Gaza.
“I believe Prime Minister Netanyahu has lost his way by allowing his political survival to take precedence over the best interests of Israel,” said Schumer.
U.S.-Israeli relations have rebounded from past disagreements. Robert Satloff, who heads the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, believes this will happen again.
With the passage of time, he said he expected there to be renewed commitment to strengthen the relationship.
Israel’s War With Gaza: What the White House Can Do to End the War, and What We Can Learn from Its Failures,” Ben-Ami, Ahmad, and Nahreen Ahmed
A younger generation sees Israel’s aggressive military campaign in Gaza, with thousands of Palestinian civilian deaths, and the ongoing occupation of Palestinian territories.
“My parents and their grandparents went through the Holocaust. Ben-Ami said his father’s family fought for Israel’s independence. The young person born in the 21st century experiences life in a completely different way. It’s not at all a surprise that there is a completely different conversation happening on college campuses versus what’s happening in senior citizen centers.”
In his testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, James Baker stated that it would take some really good faith, affirmative effort from our friends in Israel. Everybody over there should know that the telephone number is 1-202-456-1414. When you’re serious about peace, call us.”
Alzayat and others pushed the White House for a meeting with Biden instead of a dinner, though Alzayat still declined the invitation altogether. The president did host a small group of Muslim officials who work in his administration for an iftar.
There were people at the meeting. But the emergency medicine physician walked out of the meeting before it was over. He told NPR he left out of respect for his fellow Palestinians and as a signal that he believes the White House needs to do more to end the war and to get humanitarian aid into the region.
Ahmad recently returned to the United States from Gaza, where he was treating patients in Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis before it became inoperable due to fighting.
Ahmad said they had seen how overcrowded and disorganized Rafah was, and that any military activity there would be catastrophic.
Ahmad said that he wanted to communicate the message, but at the same time he wanted to make sure that it was clear that what the White House has done is not enough.
The discussions were kept quiet by the White House. The press secretary of Biden said he respects the right to peaceful protest. “We understand it’s a very painful time,” she told reporters.
Dr. Nahreen Ahmed also attended the meeting. The medical director of Med Global, who has seen the suffering in Gaza twice, said that she felt that Biden was not supportive when she showed the photos to him.
“Maybe he didn’t mean that, but you are the president of the United States and you cannot be indifferent to the suffering of people that are in front of you, and you must speak up about what is going on.”
If you have, then that isn’t the right response to a community of people that are hurt from what’s happening in Palestine and are trying to express to you their pain and their frustration.
She did not feel that the president was sympathetic to the community’s needs, and she felt the meeting was a way to manage the community.
Some people said they did not want to be invited to the iftar, so the White House scaled back on their plans.
The last 10 days of the holiest month of the year are called the holiest days, and it would be unjust to break fast on those days because of our policies in Palestine.
“The reality is we have not seen, in the last five months, the president take any responsibility for the fact that perhaps his inability to reign in (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Nashashibi said that Netanyahu had contributed to some of the loss of life.
There have been too many civilians killed. The infrastructure that was destroyed was talked about. The National Security Council is clear about the obstacles that will prevent them from getting additional humanitarian assistance in, according to John Kirby.
