'This Week' Transcript 3-31-24: Sen. Chris Van Hollen and Retired Gen. Frank McKenzie
Interview
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Well, it’s good to be with you.
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I think the Biden administration needs to enforce the president’s requests. He’s made two very simple requests. One, allow more humanitarian assistance into Gaza. The president said no excuses. He’s also said it’s a red line for him to have an invasion of Rafah.
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Well, I think we need to better use our leverage. We have different parts of leverage and one of them is sending more offensive weapons. So, President Biden needs to be as serious about ensuring more humanitarian assistance gets into Gaza as Netanyahu has been in making his demands.
I mean, we have a situation where the Netanyahu government continues to rebuff the president of the United States time and time again, ignores reasonable requests. And what do we do? We say we’re going to send more bombs.
My view is that a partnership needs to be a two-way street, not a one-way blank check with American taxpayer dollars. So, this is not about saying we’re not going to provide any more weapons. It’s about saying, hey, we have requests. Don’t let people starve to death.
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There’s no doubt that blocking aid into Gaza is a violation of international humanitarian law. With respect to certain individuals in the Netanyahu government, people like Finance Minister Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, who have not only said they want to block aid into Gaza but have taken steps to block aid into Gaza, that is a war crime.
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Well, we’re going to have to make a decision as to what the intent of the full Israel government is. I mean, these are members of the government, the finance minister and the person who’s in charge of the police. But ultimately, that will have to be decided down the road.
But in the meantime, let’s just get more assistance to starving people in Gaza. You know, one-third of the shipments of the humanitarian assistance into northern Gaza have been blocked in the last month.
You could open Erez Crossing in the north and get assistance in right now. I mean, kids starve to death.
So, I’m just saying to President Biden, you said no excuses when it comes to getting humanitarian aid into Gaza. Prime Minister Netanyahu continues to drag his feet. So, instead of just sending more bombs without in turn getting the request that you want, Mr. President, let’s at least make this a partnership.
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Well, I strongly disagree, and President Biden has disagreed. I mean, President Biden is the one who mentioned the fact that there’s an indiscriminate bombing. President Biden rightly said you can’t use humanitarian assistance as a bargaining chip. In other words, Israel is totally within its rights, in fact, I would say has a duty to defend itself after the horrific Hamas attacks of October 7. But that right does not extend to restricting unnecessarily assistance to people in Gaza.
So, yes, you could conduct this with fewer civilian casualties and certainly you could prevent the horror of this humanitarian catastrophe that we’re watching unfold.
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I certainly want President Biden to win. The future of our democracy depends on it, the future of democracies around the world depend on it. This is a case where just doing the right thing would also result in a better electoral outcome.
In other words, yes, support Israel’s right to defend itself. I’m all in on that. I’ve been that way, all in from the beginning.
But reasonable requests like preventing people from starving. I mean, 2 million Palestinians who have nothing to do with Hamas and the president needs to back up his no excuses language with real action. And just providing a blank check, providing more bombs without getting assurances now about Rafah and not making this humanitarian disaster even worse and doing simple things right now to help people who are starving to death in Gaza, those seem to be simple request.
We have a situation where Netanyahu continues to essentially, you know, give the finger to the president of the United States, and we’re sending more bombs. So, that doesn’t make sense.
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So, number one, Martha, we’re working to help the families of the six individuals.
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All of them, all immigrants. It’s a clear example about the contributions and the sacrifices that immigrants make.
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That’s right. And the other priority right now is to open the channel because this is a thriving port of Baltimore. We have over 15,000 people working directly for the port. Thousands of others -- their livelihood depends on the port. So, opening that channel is the priority.
And I want to thank President Biden because has followed through on his commitment. The Army Corps of Engineers will cover all the cost of clearing the channel. We have submitted our requests for rebuilding the bridge to the emergency relief program. We’ve been invited in that program. The federal government will pay 90 percent of the costs and Senator Cardin and I are planning to introduce legislation to cover the other 10.
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Thank you.
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