Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, of Vermont, said Israel shouldn\u2019t receive \u2018another nickel\u2019 in U.S. military aid despite the findings of a recent State Department report.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018Any objective observer knows Israel has broken international law, it has broken American law, and in my view, Israel should not be receiving another nickel in U.S. military aid,\u2019 Sanders said in an appearance on NBC\u2019s \u2018Meet the Press.\u2019 \u2018Look the facts are quite clear. Hamas is a terrible disgusting terrorist organization that began this war. Though what Israel has done over the last seven months has not just gone to war against Hamas, it has gone to war against the entire Palestinian people. And results have been absolutely catastrophic.\u2019<\/p>\n
His remarks come in response to the U.S. State Department on Friday criticizing 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
The finding of \u2018reasonable\u2019 evidence to conclude that the U.S. ally had breached international law protecting civilians in the way it conducted its war against Hamas was the strongest statement that the Biden administration has yet made on the matter. The report, which was sent to Congress on Friday and obtained by Fox News Digital, 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
Citing figures from the Hamas-controlled Palestinian government, Sanders said approximately 35,000 Palestinians are dead, while another 77,000 are wounded \u2013 two thirds of whom are women and children.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018That is not the way you conduct a war in a civilized society to the degree that war is civilized,\u2019 he continued. \u2018We\u2019re talking about 60% of the housing in Gaza having been destroyed. The civilian infrastructure \u2013 that is water, that is sewage now running out into the streets. No electricity. You are talking about a systematic destruction of the healthcare system there. Every university in Gaza has been bombed, and right now, most frighteningly, according to the humanitarian organizations, we are looking at the likelihood of hundreds of thousands of children facing starvation.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sanderds said that \u2018any country that blocks U.S. humanitarian aid is in violation of law and should not continue to receive military aid from the United States.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018Meet the Press\u2019 host Kristen Welker noted how 26 House Democrats recently sent a letter to White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on Friday, expressing that they are \u2018 deeply concerned about the message the Administration is sending to Hamas and other Iranian-backed terrorist proxies by withholding weapons shipments to Israel, during a critical moment in the negotiations.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018Does withholding weapons to Israel run the risk of prolonging this war and weakening Israel\u2019s hand against Hamas?\u2019 Welker asked Sanders.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018Every Republican, as I understand it, wants to give huge amounts of money to Israel. My guess is many Republicans want Israel to go into Rafah despite the incredible humanitarian destruction that will cause. And there are Democrats who also feel that way,\u2019 Sanders said. \u2018That is not what the American people feel. Poll after poll suggests that the American people want an immediate ceasefire. They want massive humanitarian aid to get in. People of our country do not want to be complicit in the starvation of hundreds of thousands of children.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018In terms of the international community, we are increasingly isolated in terms of our support for Israel, who is becoming a pariah nation,\u2019 he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018Is there a nonmilitary way to get rid of Hamas? Given the threat that they pose? Given that they say their very goal is to destroy Israel\u2019s existence?\u2019 Welker pushed back.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u2018You\u2019re right\u2026 that is exactly right. That is their goal. It is difficult,\u2019 Sanders said. \u2018I don\u2019t want to minimize this, so the goal is to defeat Hamas, but not to destroy or cause the enormous amount of destruction that we\u2019re now seeing in Gaza. And I hope that the future for the Palestinian people is a new generation or Palestinian leaders who focus on allowing the people to have a state of their own.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
Fox News\u2019 Brie Stimson and the Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n\n
Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, of Vermont, said Israel shouldn\u2019t receive \u2018another nickel\u2019 in U.S. military aid despite the findings of a recent State Department report.\u00a0 \u2018Any objective observer knows Israel has broken international law, it has broken American law, and in my view, Israel should not be receiving another nickel in U.S. military aid,\u2019 Sanders <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":19044,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-19043","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\/19043","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=19043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19043\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}