Blinken says US has not seen Israeli plans to protect civilians, post-war plans for Gaza

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Sunday the U.S. has not seen any plans from Israel over how the country will protect civilians or the future of Gaza after the war.

CBS’s Margaret Brennan asked Blinken on “Face the Nation” about the U.S. holding back high payload bombs to Israel, among recent concerns about the Israeli military going into Rafah — where more than a million civilians were estimated to be taking refuge. When asked if the U.S. might still deliver those bombs, Blinken said the U.S. is in an “active conversation” with Israel about it and noted the administration has “real concerns about the way they’re used.”

“We believe two things. One, you have to have a clear, credible plan to protect civilians, which we haven’t seen. Second, we also need to see a plan for what happens after this conflict in Gaza is open — is over,” he told her.

“And we still haven’t seen that, because what are we seeing right now? We’re seeing parts of Gaza that Israel has … cleared of Hamas, where Hamas is coming back, including in the north, including in Khan Younis,” he said. “As we look at — at Rafah, they may go in and have some initial success, but … potentially at an incredibly high cost to civilians; but one that is not durable, one that’s not sustainable.”

A recent review from the State Department published last week about Israel’s war conduct raised “serious concerns” about its actions in Gaza.

Biden said last week he’ll stop sending offensive weapons to Israel if it invades Rafah, where the Biden administration has repeatedly warned against invading. Blinken said Sunday that the U.S. has been working on developing a plan for post-war Gaza.

“So we’ve been working for many, many weeks on developing credible plans for security, for governance, for rebuilding. We haven’t seen that come from Israel; we’ve been working with Arab countries and others on that plan. We need to see that too,” he said.

“We have the same objective as Israel. We want to make sure that Hamas cannot govern Gaza again. We want to make sure it’s demilitarized. We want to make sure that Israel gets its leaders,” he added.