1/20/2024–|Last updated: 1/20/202408:38 PM (Mecca time)
American media reported that frustration is mounting among President Joe Biden and among members of Congress towards Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, amid concerns about the results of the war on Gaza and the “extremist” rhetoric of Israeli ministers.
On Saturday, the Associated Press quoted American officials as saying that Biden’s frustration had become “more evident” during his recent call with Netanyahu.
Yesterday, Friday, Biden and Netanyahu held their first phone call in nearly a month, and the US President said after the call that the Israeli Prime Minister does not oppose all solutions based on the existence of two states.
Hours after the call, the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office today issued a statement denying acceptance of the idea of a Palestinian state and explaining that Netanyahu assured Biden that Israel seeks security control over Gaza, “which contradicts the demand for Palestinian sovereignty,” according to the statement.
In the same context, Israeli Minister of Culture and Sports Miki Zohar said, “We will never allow the establishment of a Palestinian state.”
As for Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid, he commented on the statement issued by Netanyahu’s office by saying that “relations with the United States are so important that they cannot be turned into public disputes aimed at achieving political gains.”
He added in a post on the
Discomfort in Congress
On the other hand, the American network NBC said that pro-Israel members of Congress are sounding the alarm about the loss of confidence in Netanyahu and the way he is handling the war.
She explained that pro-Israel representatives “are now expressing their frustration with Netanyahu’s leadership,” and that there are fears that he may deliberately prolong the war in order to remain in power.
The network quoted a Democratic member of the US House of Representatives and the National Security Committee as saying that they were “disappointed and disturbed by the lack of a shift in the strategy of the war on Gaza, despite the extremely high and unacceptable rate of civilian casualties, which does not serve Israeli interests.” Or American.
NBC also quoted a Republican member as saying that he does not believe that “Netanyahu will survive, because what he must do will be very terrible, and a large number of civilians will fall in the campaign to eliminate Hamas.”
Earlier, 60 Democratic members of the US House of Representatives expressed in a letter to Secretary of State Anthony Blinken their concern about “extremist rhetoric issued by Israeli officials.”
The representatives urged Blinken to reiterate his opposition to the forced and permanent displacement of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.
In a related context, 16 Jewish members of the US House of Representatives – all from the Democratic Party – issued a statement in which they expressed their strong disagreement with Netanyahu’s statements regarding the future of the Palestinian state.
The representatives indicated that the two-state solution is the appropriate path, and among the signatories of the statement were the chief Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, Jerry Nadler, the chief Democrat on the Oversight Committee, Jamie Raskin, and Representative Adam Schiff.