Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired back at President Joe Biden on Thursday after the White House attacked him over his claim that the administration is holding back arms and ammunition necessary for Israel’s war.
As Breitbart News has reported, Biden confirmed in May that the U.S. had held back a shipment of heavy precision bombs in a failed attempt to deter Israel’s attack on the last Hamas strongholds in Rafah, in southern Gaza. Biden also said that the U.S. would withhold artillery shipments if Israel did not do enough to protect Palestinian civilians.
Earlier this week, there were unconfirmed reports that the U.S. had told Israel all arms shipments would be resuming. Then Netanyahu posted a video in which he urged the administration to stop holding back weapons — an unusually public and direct criticism, which indicated that the Israeli government believed the U.S. was, in fact, holding back.
The White House professed ignorance, and Netanyahu absorbed criticism from his domestic opponents, who rebuked him for taking on the Biden administration so openly. But Republican senators backed up Netanyahu’s version of events. In a letter to the White House on Thursday, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) accused Biden of using bureaucratic tricks to slow down the delivery of a wide variety of weapons to Israel that Congress had already approved for sale:
Your administration is engaged in bureaucratic sleight-of-hand to withhold this crucial aid to Israel during a shooting war. As you are aware, the Arms Export Control Act requires the administration to notify Congress before sending weapons to a foreign country. Your administration has manipulated this requirement by withholding this formal notification to Congress of approved weapons sales, including F-15s, tactical vehicles, 120-mm mortars, 120-mm tank rounds, joint direct attack munitions, and small diameter bombs. Your administration can then claim that the weapons are “in process” while never delivering them.
The need for weapons is particularly acute, as Israel is facing a growing threat from Iran-backed Hezbollah terrorists in southern Lebanon, even as the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) closes in on the last Hamas battalions in Gaza.
White House national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Thursday that the administration disputed Netanyahu’s claim of withholding weapons, calling it “vexing and disappointing to us as much as it was incorrect.”
Netanyahu responded in a statement to the press: “I am willing to absorb personal attacks if that is what it takes for Israel to get the arms and ammunition it needs in its war for survival.”
The Biden administration has openly backed calls for new elections to oust Netanyahu.
Ironically, Biden’s opposition has strengthened Netanyahu in Israeli polls.
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 e-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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