Biden heading to Israel and Jordan, focused on ground offensive and
humanitarian crisis
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[October 17, 2023]
By Steve Holland
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden leaves on Tuesday on a
whirlwind trip to Israel and Jordan to get an update on Israel's war
aims in its looming battle with Hamas militants and stress the need to
get humanitarian assistance to Gaza civilians.
Biden is expected to spend part of Wednesday in Tel Aviv for talks with
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other officials as Israel
prepares a ground offensive aimed at eliminating Hamas militants in Gaza
who killed 1,300 people during a rampage through southern Israeli towns
on Oct. 7.
Biden will then fly to Amman for talks about accelerating humanitarian
assistance to Gaza.
In Amman, he will meet Jordan's King Abdullah, Egyptian President Abdel
Fattah al-Sisi, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has long
been opposed to Hamas and whose organization exercises limited self-rule
in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Biden's second trip to a war zone this year - he visited Ukraine in
February - carries some risk. His goal will be to show American
solidarity with Netanyahu while trying to avoid a broader regional war
involving Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah and Syria.
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The United States has stationed a carrier strike group in the eastern
Mediterranean in a show of force for Israel and a second is on the way.
Biden also wants to avert a humanitarian calamity in Gaza where
authorities say more than 2,800 people have already been killed in
Israeli bombardment over the last week.
Hundreds of tons of aid from several countries have been waiting in
Egypt's Sinai peninsula for days pending a deal for its safe delivery to
Gaza and the evacuation of some foreign passport holders through the
Rafah crossing.
"He'll make it clear that we want to continue working with all our
partners in the region, including Israel, to get humanitarian assistance
in and provide some kind of safe passage for civilians to get out," said
White House national security spokesperson John Kirby.
Biden and Netanyahu, thrown into a wartime partnership despite deep
political differences on the way forward in the Middle East, have joined
forces.
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![](../images/101723PIX/news_l91.jpg)
U.S. President Joe Biden holds a bilateral meeting with Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the sidelines of the 78th U.N.
General Assembly in New York City, U.S., September 20, 2023.
REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo
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Biden has given Israel full-throated support while stressing the
need to head off a massive humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Their face-to-face meeting, after holding several phone calls since
the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas, will allow Biden to privately discuss
concerns and possible red lines in the coming Gaza invasion.
Biden will also get an update on the scores of hostages taken by
Hamas.
The State Department has said 29 citizens of the United States were
killed in the Hamas attacks in Israel, with 15 citizens and one
lawful permanent resident unaccounted for.
Israel has vowed to annihilate the Hamas movement.
Biden will make clear that "Israel has the right and indeed the duty
to defend its people from Hamas and other terrorists and to prevent
future attacks," Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters
after hours of talks with Israel's war cabinet in Tel Aviv.
He said Israel would brief Biden on its war aims and strategy and on
how it will conduct operations "in a way that minimizes civilian
casualties and enables humanitarian assistance to flow to civilians
in Gaza in a way that does not benefit Hamas."
The U.S. and Israel agreed to develop a plan that will enable
humanitarian aid from donor nations and multilateral organizations
to reach civilians in Gaza, Blinken said.
(Reporting By Steve Holland; additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk
in Tel Aviv; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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