Israel-Hamas war: US State Department official resigns over Biden’s ‘one-sided support’ of Israel

A US State Department official tendered his resignation over the Biden administration’s decision to boost military aid to Israel which is currently fighting Hamas in the besieged Gaza City.

Josh Paul, a director in the State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs which handles arms transfers, in his dissent note published online on Wednesday (Oct 18) called the administration’s response “an impulsive reaction” based on “intellectual bankruptcy.”

“The response Israel is taking, and with it the American support both for that response and for the status quo of the occupation, will only lead to more and deeper suffering for both the Israeli and the Palestinian people,” he wrote.

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“I fear we are repeating the same mistakes we have made these past decades, and I decline to be a part of it for longer,” he said.

Paul’s note of dissent marks a rare display of internal conflict over Biden’s foreign policy which has openly sided with Israel and endorsed its retaliatory attacks on Gaza in its pursuit of wiping out Hamas.

While not official yet, US media reported that the Biden administration is earmarking at least $40 billion of military aid to Israel.

‘US blindly supporting one side’

He further said that Washington’s “blind support for one side” was leading to policy decisions that were “shortsighted, destructive, unjust and contradictory to the very values we publicly espouse”.

Paul equally condemned Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel as “a monstrosity of monstrosities”, but also pointed out that Israelimilitary’s response “will only lead to more and deeper suffering for both the Israeli and the Palestinian people – and is not in the long term American interest”.

The official, who spent more than 11 years in his role, claimed that the US sending military aid to Israel will give the country a free hand to run amok in Gaza, regardless of the civilian toll.

Biden calls for calm

It comes hours after US President Joe Biden, in his visit to Tel Aviv, appealed for calm and asked Israelis to not “repeat the mistakes the US made post 9/11”.

Meanwhile, the toll in the Israel-Hamas war continued to grow on Thursday with at least3,785 Palestinians losing their lives in the Israeli retaliatory attacks, thePalestinian health ministry said.

According to the health ministry, among thosekilled, 1,524 were children, 1,000 women, and 120 elderly. Around12,493 people have also been injured, the officials added.

While Israel recorded over 1,200 deaths in the Hamas terror attack.

(With inputs from agencies)

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