2023-11-09 02:13:00
A “more targeted” offensive by Israel in Gaza is “vital”, influential US Democratic Senator Chris Murphy said on Wednesday in an interview with AFP, saying that the number of Palestinian civilians killed was “too high”.
“I fear that if Israel’s strategy and final objective are to defeat Hamas, this rate of civilian losses, which certainly has a moral cost, also has a strategic cost,” alerted the elected official, member of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee.
In the Gaza Strip, 10,569 people, the majority civilians including 4,324 children, were killed by Israeli bombings, according to the latest report from the Hamas Ministry of Health.
Along with around twenty of his peers, Senator Chris Murphy sent a letter on Wednesday to US President Joe Biden, the leader of his party, urging Israel to “respect the laws of war” and to “learn from the mistakes” of the United States in the fight against terrorism.
“Create many terrorists”
“What we have learned is that when you are too lenient on civilian deaths… you end up killing a lot of terrorists, but you also end up creating a lot of terrorists,” he said. estimated Chris Murphy from AFP.
“I think that the number of civilians killed is too high and that a more targeted offensive would be important and vital,” declared the elected official.
The senator argued that Israeli strikes “must be directed more by ground units than by air strikes”, one of the solutions, according to him, to limit civilian losses.
The elected representative, representing the small state of Connecticut, neighboring New York, in the American Senate is nevertheless opposed, like the president, to a cease-fire.
Vote of young people and Arab Americans?
“It takes two to participate in a ceasefire and Hamas has made it clear that it intends to attack Israel again,” he argued. “A ceasefire would allow Hamas to regroup and begin preparing its next attack,” said the elected official.
On October 7, Hamas commandos infiltrated southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian territory under Israeli blockade, carrying out a bloody attack against civilians on a scale and violence never seen since the creation of Israel in 1948.
More than 1,400 people were killed on the Israeli side, mainly civilians massacred by the Islamist movement that day, according to Israeli authorities.
“I have said loud and clear that Israel must reduce the number of civilian casualties,” Chris Murphy said. “But I also want to make it clear that Hamas has put itself in a position and put civilians in a position where they are in danger,” he said.
One year before the American presidential election, are the Democrats not afraid with this speech of losing the support of young people, Arabs and American Muslims?
The country was rocked this weekend by major demonstrations in favor of a ceasefire in Gaza, with some participants brandishing signs with the message: “Joe the genocidaire, you have lost my voice.”
“I don’t think you can worry about elections when you’re making important decisions about foreign policy, war and peace,” said Chris Murphy.
He added: “I think the President should do what he thinks is right for the national security of the United States, and leave the politics to others.”
09/11/2023 01:11:41 –
Washington (AFP) –
© 2023 AFP
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