Warren to boycott Netanyahu speech to Congress

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) will not attend a speech by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expected to be delivered next month to a joint meeting of Congress, she told The Hill on Tuesday.

“Benjamin Netanyahu has created a humanitarian disaster,” Warren said.

“The United States needs to be using its leverage, including restrictions on arm sales, as a way to advance a push toward peace in the Middle East,” she said when asked for her reaction to the Biden administration’s pursuit of a military sale to Israel.

“We need a cease-fire, massive humanitarian relief, the return of the hostages, and we’ve gotta have a breakthrough on getting the parties to the negotiating table. Giving more arms to Israel is not pushing in the right direction,” Warren continued.

She is part of a small group of Senate Democrats that is pushing President Biden to take a harder line with Israel over the conduct of its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

This group wants Biden to hold back weapons deliveries and military sales as a point of leverage to influence the Israeli government. In particular, they spoke out about a military sale that is set to advance after senior Democratic lawmakers this week withdrew objections.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), said Biden should use a pause in weapons sales to pressure Israel to do more to scale up humanitarian aid deliveries to the Gaza Strip, pull back military operations in the southern Gazan city of Rafah, crack down on violent and extremist Israeli settlers in the West Bank and follow through on commitments with the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah. 

Van Hollen said he had not yet decided whether he will attend Netanyahu’s speech, expected on July 24, when asked by The Hill.

“I think it was a mistake to invite him. I will make a decision later on,” he said. 

The Republican and Democratic leaders of the House and Senate last month delivered an invitation to Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress in July, to present “the Israeli government’s vision for defending democracy, combating terror, and establishing a just and lasting peace in the region.” 

The majority of Congress is supportive of Israel’s more than eight-month war to defeat Hamas, in response to the group’s Oct. 7 attack against the country, with more than 1,100 people killed and about 250 taken as hostages.

But the U.S. is also working to establish a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas as the best way to compel Hamas to release 120 hostages and allow for a scale up of humanitarian aid to the strip which has been devastated under the Israeli assault, with the nearly entire population of 2 million people in need of some assistance, according to international aid organizations. 

An estimated 37,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war, according to health authorities under control of Hamas, but that fails to distinguish combatants from civilians. Israel estimates it has killed between 15,000 to 17,000 Hamas fighters.