Barr to Blinken: Don’t accuse Israel of breaking international law in Gaza

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Secretary of State Antony Blinken says it’s reasonable to believe that Israeli security forces breached international law in executing a ruthless seven-month campaign against Hamas in Gaza that has killed thousands of civilians.

But Lexington Republican Rep. Andy Barr says the Biden administration shouldn’t say so.

“We need to come to their defense and not accuse them of violating international law,” Barr told Blinken during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing Wednesday.

It’s a demonstration of how fervently committed Barr is to the Israeli cause in the wake of the Oct. 7 attacks, even as a younger generation clamorously aligns with the Palestinians.

“There’s nothing surprising about this. For most members of Congress, unconditional support for Israel is the ‘smart’ political choice, even if doing so undermines U.S. interests,” said Stephen Walt, a Harvard University professor of international affairs and author of the book “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy.”

“Treating Israel like a normal country will just get them in hot water at home and encourage AIPAC and groups in the Israel lobby to back opposition candidates,” Walt continued. “So Israel is free to do whatever it wants.”

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The American Israel Public Affairs Committee contributed $19,100 to Barr during the 2022 campaign cycle, according to Open Secrets.

A State Department report released earlier this month found certain instances where Israel used U.S. weapons to act outside of international humanitarian law, citing the high civilian casualty count in Gaza.

Barr believes Blinken’s words may have contributed to the International Criminal Court’s decision to prosecute Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a decision that Republicans have roundly panned as outrageous and President Joe Biden himself has rejected. The ICC is also seeking to prosecute leaders of Hamas.

“There’s no equivalence between Israel and Hamas,” the president has declared. “Contrary to allegations against Israel made by the International Court… what’s happening is not genocide.”

Blinken explained to Barr that the ICC should not have attempted to submit warrants for Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant because the U.S. and Israel are both investigating the abuse of American weaponry.

Yet Barr ostensibly does not believe the U.S. should even accuse Israel of any violations as it prosecutes its war against Hamas. When he pressed Blinken to disavow that assessment, the secretary stood his ground.

And he defended the Biden administration decision to pause a shipment of high-grade munitions to Israel due to worry about civilian casualties in Rafah, the southernmost strip in Gaza.

“We’ve seen and we’ve had concerns about the way these large yield munitions have been used in dense environments,” Blinken told Barr.

But Barr charged that it’s domestic politics that’s pressuring the Biden administration to pull back, as scores of young people stage protests and encampments on college campuses against the U.S.-backed military campaign.

Whether Israel is actually in violation of international law is contested among experts.

“As Blinken should know, a particular attack’s legality is not dependent on the number of casualties actually inflicted, let alone on a terrorist group’s fictitious figures,” said retired Lt. Col. Geoffrey Corn, a distinguished fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America.

But the chief prosecutor of the ICC, Karim Khan, has centered his warrant around Israel’s intentional use of starvation of civilians as a method of warfare.

“The crime is not limited solely to the deprivation of food, but includes other objects indispensable for the survival of civilians such as water, fuel and medicine,” reads the ICC report.