Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu struck a defiant tone against US President Joe Biden after Washington withheld a shipment of bombs as a warning to its top Middle East ally not to invade the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
In a first, punchy clip on the social media site X, Netanyahu said: “If we have to stand alone, we will stand alone” and “fight tooth and nail.”
He then pivoted to a more conciliatory approach when chatting with Phil McGraw, the US talk show host known as Dr Phil.
Photo: AP
“I’ve known Joe Biden for many years, 40 years and more,” Netanyahu said in the interview on Thursday on Dr Phil Primetime broadcast on Merit Street Media. “We often had agreements, but we’ve had our disagreements and we’ve been able to overcome them. I hope we can overcome them now.”
Netanyahu said Israel must go into Rafah to finish off the remaining battalions of Hamas, the US-designated terrorist group that killed 1,200 Israelis and kidnapped about 250 on Oct. 7 last year.
He said Hamas would “murder again and again” if allowed to survive in Rafah.
“We have to achieve victory,” he said. “That means we have to destroy all these battalions, which we will. We face very strong opposition to that, but we’re going to overcome it.”
Netanyahu said Israel would do its utmost to make sure civilians leave Rafah, where more than 1 million people are sheltering, before any attack.
He also criticized the “madness” of pro-Palestinian rallies on US college campuses, saying protesters are “supporting genocide,” adding that this reflected “the sorry state of American higher education.”
On Wednesday, Biden said he would halt additional shipments of offensive weapons to Israel if it launches a ground invasion of Rafah, decrying the potential loss of civilian life as “just wrong.”
“We’re going to continue to make sure Israel is secure in terms of Iron Dome and their ability to respond to attacks that came out of the Middle East recently,” Biden said in an interview with CNN, referring to air-defense weaponry. “But it’s just wrong. We’re not going to supply the weapons and artillery shells.”
Like Netanyahu, US officials followed sharp criticism with more conciliatory remarks on Thursday.
White House officials said the US stands by its ally, while urging Netanyahu to refrain from an assault that could worsen the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said that the administration paused, but did not cancel, the shipment of about 3,500 bombs, which he said was limited to specific munitions that could add to the civilian death toll in Gaza.
“The arguments that somehow we’re walking away from Israel flies in the face of the facts,” Kirby told reporters.
There were also indications that the White House had not sought an open confrontation with Netanyahu.
US officials initially planned to inform the Israeli government privately that the US intended to pause the bomb shipment to ramp up pressure on Netanyahu — but not to follow through unless there was a major incursion into urban areas of Rafah. However, that plan was foiled when Israeli officials leaked it, people familiar with the situation said.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
China has built a land-based prototype nuclear reactor for a large surface warship, in the clearest sign yet Beijing is advancing toward producing the nation’s first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, according to a new analysis of satellite imagery and Chinese government documents provided to The Associated Press. There have long been rumors that China is planning to build a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, but the research by the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California is the first to confirm it is working on a nuclear-powered propulsion system for a carrier-sized surface warship. Why is China’s pursuit of nuclear-powered carriers significant? China’s navy is already
‘SIGNS OF ESCALATION’: Russian forces have been aiming to capture Ukraine’s eastern Donbas province and have been capturing new villages as they move toward Pokrovsk Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi on Saturday said that Ukraine faced increasing difficulties in its fight against Moscow’s invasion as Russian forces advance and North Korean troops prepare to join the Kremlin’s campaign. Syrskyi, relating comments he made to a top US general, said outnumbered Ukrainian forces faced Russian attacks in key sectors of the more than two-and-a-half-year-old war with Russia. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a nightly address said that Ukraine’s military command was focused on defending around the town of Kurakhove — a target of Russia’s advances along with Pokrovsk, a logistical hub to the north. He decried strikes
RSS