President Joe Biden plans to introduce a resolution at the United Nations Security Council calling for a temporary “ceasefire” and demanding Israel refrain from conducting an attack on the last Hamas battalions in Gaza that are the key to winning the war.
Israel has been adamant that it must attack Hamas in Rafah, a city in southern Gaza on the Egyptian border, to win the war. Rafah is the last stronghold of the Palestinian terror organization, and also the key to smuggling routes into and out of Gaza.
The White House has said publicly that it would not support an attack on Rafah, at least without an evacuation of civilians. Even after Israel promised to develop a plan to evacuate civilians, the Biden administration has opposed an Israeli operation in Gaza.
That opposition has continued despite a successful Israeli raid last Monday that rescued two civilian Israeli hostages from Rafah. It has become evident that Biden intends to let Hamas survive, to use it as leverage to force Israel to accept a Palestinian state.
The U.S. promised to veto a resolution, set to be introduced Tuesday by Algeria, calling for a permanent ceasefire. But the Times of Israel reported Monday on a draft alternative resolution by the U.S. that would use the word “ceasefire,” in a temporary sense.
NEW: Last night @USUN shared its own #UNSC draft resolution on #Gaza with like minded countries. In OP3, #US draft text “determines that under current circumstances a major ground offensive into #Rafah would result in further harm to civilians and their further displacement… pic.twitter.com/5RwgwzPU0j
— Rami Ayari (@Raminho) February 19, 2024
The Times of Israel noted:
The United States has proposed a rival draft of the United Nations Security Council resolution that would underscore the body’s “support for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza as soon as practicable,” according to the text seen by Reuters on Monday.
Washington has been averse to the word “ceasefire” in any UN action on the Israel-Hamas war, but the US draft text echoes language that US President Joe Biden said he used last week in conversations with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The US draft text also “determines that under current circumstances a major ground offensive into Rafah would result in further harm to civilians and their further displacement including potentially into neighboring countries.”
It is unclear whether the language in the resolution opposing an attack on Hamas in Rafah would be binding.
Hamas has insisted on a permanent ceasefire before it releases the remaining 134 Israeli hostages — a demand that the Biden administration has now ratified by seeking a temporary ceasefire that it openly hopes will lead to a broader halt to the fighting, despite the fact that Hamas would survive.
The administration has avoided saying whether it sees Hamas as part of a future government in Gaza.
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 recent book, “The Zionist Conspiracy (and how to join it),” now available on Audible. He is also the author of the 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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