The U.S. State Department on Friday criticized Israel\u2019s use of U.S-supplied arms in a way that may be \u2018inconsistent\u2019 in \u2018mitigating civilian harm\u2019 in the war in Gaza.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A report obtained by Fox News Digital, which was sent to Congress on Friday, admitted that \u2018Israel has had to confront an extraordinary military challenge: Hamas has embedded itself deliberately within and underneath the civilian population to use civilians as human shields.\u2019<\/p>\n
The report added that \u2018it is often difficult to determine facts on the ground in an active war zone of this nature and the presence of legitimate military targets across Gaza.\u2019<\/p>\n
Nearly 35,000 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict, including many women and children, according to the Palestinian government.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The report was commissioned by President Biden to assess if Israel and other U.S. allies are adhering to international humanitarian law.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Israeli officials have said the country is complying with international law \u2018and have identified a number of processes for ensuring compliance that are embedded at all levels of their military decision-making,\u2019 the report said, including giving advanced warnings, using specific weapons and avoiding places like schools, hospitals and places of worship.<\/p>\n
\u2018Although we have gained some insight into Israel\u2019s procedures and rules, we do not have complete information to verify whether\u2019 U.S. arms \u2018were specifically used in actions that have been alleged as violations of [international humanitarian law] or international human rights law during the period of the report,\u2019 the report continued. \u2018The nature of the conflict in Gaza makes it difficult to assess or reach conclusive findings on individual incidents.\u2019<\/p>\n
It said, however, that the United Nations, humanitarian organizations and international humanitarian law experts \u2018have reported Israeli civilian harm mitigation efforts as inconsistent, ineffective, and inadequate, failing to provide protection to vulnerable civilians who cannot or chose not to relocate.\u2019<\/p>\n
Israel has the capability, experience and tools to mitigate civilian harm, the report said, adding, however, \u2018the results on the ground, including high levels of civilian casualties, raise substantial questions as to whether the IDF is using them effectively in all cases.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
Despite misgivings, the State Department said it found Israel\u2019s assurances that it had followed international law in the use of U.S. weapons \u2018credible and reliable\u2019 and will continue supplying arms.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n
The U.S. State Department on Friday criticized Israel\u2019s use of U.S-supplied arms in a way that may be \u2018inconsistent\u2019 in \u2018mitigating civilian harm\u2019 in the war in Gaza.\u00a0 A report obtained by Fox News Digital, which was sent to Congress on Friday, admitted that \u2018Israel has had to confront an extraordinary military challenge: Hamas has <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":18994,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-18993","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18993\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}