U.S. President Joe Biden on Wednesday backed Israel’s position that it is not responsible for Tuesday’s deadly blast at a hospital in the Gaza Strip.
In a press conference held after his talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv, Biden said that the information he has seen thus far indicates that it was not Israel but “the other team” that caused the blast, citing Pentagon data showing that the explosion was likely not caused by an Israeli airstrike.
The president also said he plans to ask Congress for an “unprecedented support package for Israel’s defense” without going into details, but the amount is speculated to be around 100 billion dollars in a foreign aid package that would include increased aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan.
On the latest conflict, Biden cautioned against being consumed by rage as he said “the vast majority of Palestinians are not Hamas,” and that “Hamas does not represent the Palestinian people.”
He then revealed plans to provide 100 million dollars in humanitarian assistance to Gaza and the West Bank to support the more than one million people displaced by the ongoing war.
Biden also expressed support for the “two-state solution” as he stressed the need to “keep pursuing a path so that Israel and the Palestinian people can both live safely and securely in dignity and in peace.”
The proposed framework for the two-state solution resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would establish an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel, resulting in two states for two peoples.