Israeli army battle tanks and other military vehicles are positioned in southern Israel near the border with the Gaza Strip on May 9.AHMAD GHARABLI/Getty Images
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu struck a defiant tone on Thursday in response to U.S. President Joe Biden’s pledge to stop at least some shipments of weapons to Israel if the country proceeds with plans to invade the city of Rafah.
Despite pressure from the U.S., Israel’s long-time ally and military supplier, the Israeli army bombarded parts of the outskirts of the city. Rafah, the biggest Gazan population centre not overrun by Israeli forces, is where Palestinians displaced from elsewhere in the Gaza Strip have gathered. Israeli officials have said Hamas fighters are hiding in Rafah, and that a military operation in the city is necessary to achieve Israel’s stated aim of defeating the militant group.
In a video statement Thursday, Mr. Netanyahu vowed Israel would plow ahead with or without U.S. support. “If we have to stand alone, we will stand alone,” he said. “If we must, we shall fight with our fingernails. But we have much more than our fingernails.”
Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, a spokesperson for the Israeli military, said the country already has the weapons it needs to attack Rafah. He played down the significance of the dispute with the U.S.
A day earlier, the Biden administration confirmed reports that it had held up a planned shipment to Israel of 2,000- and 500-pound bombs while it waited to see whether Mr. Netanyahu would move on Rafah.
The move to restrict arms shipments to Israel appeared to be an attempt by Mr. Biden to tamp down both the war in Gaza and unrest within his Democratic Party at home. It came after repeated expressions of concern from his administration in recent weeks about the mounting civilian death toll from the conflict.
Why the U.S. paused the delivery of 2,000-pound bombs to Israel ahead of a possible Rafah attack
In an interview with CNN Wednesday evening, Mr. Biden lamented that “civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence” of bombs supplied by the U.S. He said he had told Mr. Netanyahu that he would not help him further if he invaded Rafah or other urban areas in the Gaza Strip.
“If they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities,” Mr. Biden said.
He said he would continue to help Israel’s military in other ways, such as by providing munitions for the country’s Iron Dome air-defence system.
He also clarified that he did not yet consider Israel to have invaded Rafah, though when he was speaking Israel had already seized control of the Gaza side of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt, a vital route for aid. About 80,000 people have fled Rafah this week, according to the United Nations.
Ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas had been taking place in Cairo this week, but those talks reportedly halted on Thursday. The discussions, which also involved the U.S., Egypt and Qatar, had been aimed toward achieving a stop in the fighting in exchange for Hamas releasing hostages it took when it attacked Israel on Oct. 7, leading Israel to retaliate with its invasion of Gaza.
Displaced Palestinians arrive in vehicles carrying their belongings to set up shelter after returning to Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip on May 9.-/Getty Images
While negotiations did not appear to have completely broken down, Hamas left the table without a deal.
Aaron David Miller, a former State Department official who advised on Arab-Israeli negotiations, said in an interview that the Biden administration stopping an arms shipment was more “a datapoint” than a significant change in relations between the U.S. and Israel.
“This is not an arms embargo. This is not a major rupture in the U.S.-Israel relationship,” he said. “I don’t see it as a fundamental point of departure in either the President’s view or the nature of the relationship.”
Mr. Miller, who is now a fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, pointed out that the Biden administration has continued to send other military aid to the country. He also cited a precedent for the move: In 1981, Ronald Reagan delayed a shipment of F16 bombers to Israel after the country bombed Beirut and an Iraqi nuclear reactor.
There is a strong constituency in Mr. Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition government that favours attacking Rafah, Mr. Miller said, but there are reasons Israel might hold back. For one, such an invasion could last months, since Hamas’s fighters are likely entrenched in the city. There is also a possibility that restraint could lead to the release of hostages.
“The negotiations did not work but they are still in train. As long as that is the case and the concern of the hostages becomes the centrepiece of that negotiation, the Israelis will refrain,” he said.
Mr. Biden is a long-time supporter of Israel – he pushed a US$26-billion aid package for the country through Congress last month – but he has repeatedly expressed alarm at the mounting humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, where the Israeli military has killed civilians and starved the small Palestinian enclave with a blockade. Previously, the White House has cajoled Israel into letting food, medicine and other aid into Gaza.
On Thursday, the first boat of aid bound for a U.S. pier off the coast of Gaza left Cyprus. The U.S. began building the pier last month as a way of getting around attempts by Israel to limit the aid allowed into the enclave through land borders.
The Democrats, meanwhile, are split between Israel supporters and supporters of Palestinians. Facing a tough re-election fight in November, Mr. Biden risks losing the votes of Arab-Americans and Muslims. Also at risk is the support of young voters, who polling has shown are generally more sympathetic to the Palestinian cause than their elders. Over the past three weeks, the U.S. has seen a wave of pro-Palestinian campus protests.
Since last year, some Democratic legislators have called on Mr. Biden to put conditions on military aid to Israel, in a bid to shape its conduct of the war. His move this week suggests he may have finally acceded to the demand.
He could, however, face pushback from voters sympathetic to Israel. Republicans, who tend to staunchly back Israel, moved to take advantage.
“If any Jewish person voted for Joe Biden, they should be ashamed of themselves,” former president Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, told reporters on Thursday outside of his hush-money trial in New York.
With reports from the Associated Press and Reuters
President Joe Biden on May 8 publicly warned Israel for the first time that the U.S. would stop supplying weapons if Israeli forces make a major invasion of Rafah, a refugee-packed city in southern Gaza.
Reuters