The leader of the U.S. Senate, Chuck Schumer, called for new elections to be held in Israel, in the harshest criticism yet by a senior U.S. official of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's administration's actions in Gaza, which is globally criticized for amounting to genocide.
Schumer, the highest-ranking elected Jewish American in history, came amid increased pressure from President Joe Biden over the mounting death toll in Gaza due to Israel's attacks.
"As a democracy, Israel has the right to choose its own leaders, and we should let the chips fall where they may. But the important thing is that Israelis are given a choice," said Schumer, the head of the chamber's Democratic majority, without suggesting a timeline for a vote.
"There needs to be a fresh debate about the future of Israel after Oct. 7."
Schumer said Netanyahu was one of four "major obstacles" to a two-state solution and peace, alongside Hamas and its Palestinian supporters, radical right-wing Israelis and the Palestinian Authority's leader Mahmoud Abbas.
He accused the Israeli leader of surrounding himself with right-wing extremists and being "too willing to tolerate the civilian toll in Gaza, which is pushing support for Israel worldwide to historic lows."
"Israel cannot survive if it becomes a pariah," Schumer, an outspoken ally of the Israeli government who visited the country just days after the attacks, told colleagues on the Senate floor.
He warned that if Netanyahu's coalition continued to pursue "dangerous and inflammatory" policies after the war, the United States would look at playing "a more active role in shaping Israeli policy by using our leverage to change the present course."
Vowing to destroy Hamas after the Oct. 7 attack, Israel has carried out a relentless campaign of bombardment and ground operations in Gaza, killing at least 31,341 people, most of them civilians, according to the territory's health ministry. It has also imposed a brutal blockade on the enclave, prohibiting the entry of vital humanitarian aid supplies, including food, medicine and more.
The United Nations is warning of famine amid hampered efforts to get more aid into the war-devastated Gaza Strip, and desperate residents have stormed relief shipments.
Mediators failed to reach a truce between Israel and Hamas for the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan, which started on Monday, and Hamas authorities have since reported more than 40 airstrikes across Gaza.
Daily aid airdrops by multiple nations have been taking place but the air and sea missions are not seen as adequate, and the U.N. has reported difficulty in accessing Gaza's north with aid.
"The Netanyahu coalition no longer fits the needs of Israel after Oct. 7. The world has changed radically since then and the Israeli people are being stifled right now by a governing vision that is stuck in the past," Schumer said.
"Nobody expects Prime Minister Netanyahu to do the things that must be done to break the cycle of violence, preserve Israel's credibility on the world stage, and work towards a two-state solution."
Republican minority leader Mitch McConnell described Schumer's call for new elections in Israel as "grotesque and hypocritical," given Democrats' concerns about foreign interference in U.S. elections.
"The Jewish state of Israel deserves an ally that acts like one," he said.
Strains between Biden and Netanyahu have added momentum to discussions within the U.S. administration about how it could use its leverage to convince Israel not to carry out a ground offensive in the south of the enclave, facilitate humanitarian relief and avoid further heavy Palestinian civilian casualties, U.S. officials say.
Dismissing Biden’s strident criticism to MSNBC in which he spoke of red lines and said Netanyahu was "hurting Israel more than helping," the Israeli premier has vowed to press forward with the military campaign in Rafah, the last part of the Gaza Strip where Israeli forces have not carried out a ground offensive.
"You know what the red line is? That Oct. 7 doesn’t happen again," Netanyahu, who is known as Bibi and has had a long and often tense relationship with Biden, told Politico on Sunday.
Israel has made clear to the U.S. that it is prepared to withstand the international condemnation it had expected to face over its overwhelming military response to the Oct. 7 Hamas incursion, according to a person in Washington familiar with the matter.
While U.S. officials have said there is no sign of an imminent assault on Rafah, Biden and his aides have issued repeated warnings about the need for Israel's restraint there. European Union countries have said an attack would be "catastrophic."
Public messaging from the United States has sharpened since the deaths of more than 100 Palestinians earlier this month as they rushed to get food from an aid convoy in northern Gaza.
