2024-03-11 06:08:20
US President Joe Biden, who criticized the way the war in Gaza is being waged, is “wrong”, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said today in an interview with Politico newspaper, Agence France-Presse reported, quoted by BTA.
The US president said Netanyahu was “doing more harm than good to Israel” with the way the war in Gaza is being waged.
“I don’t know exactly what the president had in mind, but if he meant that I was conducting a personal policy against the will of the majority of Israelis and that I was going against Israel’s interests, then he is wrong on both counts,” the Israeli prime minister said.
“First, I am not pursuing a personal policy, this is a policy supported by the overwhelming majority of Israelis. They support the actions we took to destroy the terrorist battalions of Hamas,” Netanyahu added.
“The Israelis also support my position that we must categorically reject the attempt to impose a Palestinian state on us,” he added at a time when the two-state solution is gaining international traction.
“The Israelis understand that if we do anything else, we will have a repeat of the killings of October 7, which will harm Israel, the Palestinians and peace in the Middle East,” Netanyahu said.
“So to say that my politics are personal and that I don’t have the support of Israelis is false,” he said, reiterating that “the vast majority of Israelis are united like never before and understand what is important to Israel.”
The US president, who has grown increasingly disillusioned with his Israeli ally and is criticized among his Democratic constituents for his staunch support for Israel’s policies, had unusually harsh words for Netanyahu yesterday.
“He has a right to defend Israel, he has a right to continue attacking Hamas. But he should be more careful about the innocent lives that have been lost as a result of his actions,” Biden said in an interview with MSNBC. Xi added: “In my opinion, he does more harm than good to Israel.”
The war in Gaza was sparked by a bloody attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, which killed around 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military operation in Gaza has so far killed 31,045 people, most of them civilians, according to the Hamas Health Ministry.