The Biden administration is ratcheting up pressure on the Israeli government to declare a “pause” in fighting against Hamas — even as Israel continues to push the terror organization into a corner.
On Friday, as Breitbart News reported, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu firmly and publicly rejected calls for a “pause,” saying there would be no stop to the fighting until Hamas released the 240 hostages it still holds in Gaza.
The Wall Street Journal reported Monday:
President Biden, in a phone call Monday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, urged the Israeli leader to declare a humanitarian pause, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.
The conversation came hours after Central Intelligence Agency Director Bill Burnsarrived in Israel, following a visit to the region by Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Biden’s special envoy for the Middle East, David Satterfield, also returned to Israel, seeking to negotiate the terms of a temporary pause in its assault to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza.
…
Israeli defiance over a humanitarian pause has been a source of contention with Washington—including with Biden, who has grown increasingly frustrated by Israel’s refusal, officials said.
There is no clear military justification for a “pause”; Biden seems to have embraced the idea following protests by the Muslim- and Arab-American communities, especially in Michigan, a swing state that Biden needs to win to be reelected in 2024.
Israel fears that any stop to the fighting would allow Hamas to regroup, and would create an opportunity for international pressure to build on Israel not to resume the fighting, and therefore to save Hamas from destruction — a strategic defeat.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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