White House: We Don’t Support Israel Operating in South Gaza ‘Until They Have Factored in’ ‘Additional Civilians’

On Friday’s broadcast of Bloomberg TV’s “Balance of Power,” White House National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby stated that the White House doesn’t support Israel operating against Hamas in the southern portion of Gaza “unless or until they have factored in all those additional civilians” in the area and all civilians in the area.

Kirby said, “We have made two points here: One, we’ve told the Israelis, very consistently, we don’t support southern operations unless or until they have factored in all those additional civilians — actually, all civilians, but noting that there are now hundreds of thousands more civilians. Number two, … we have also urged them to think about how to do this in a way that keeps those civilians safe. Now, I don’t want to get into whether there [are] safe zones called for or what that could look like, but we certainly want to see them pursue these operations in a way that properly accounts for that civilian population, and [that], to the maximum degree that it can, inoculate[s] them from these combat operations, so that they’re not in harm’s way, that they’re not caught in the crossfire between Israel and Hamas.”

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