Graham: US won’t support Gaza war pause without hostage release

The United States will only support a pause to the Gaza war that includes the release of hostages, Senator Lindsay Graham (R-South Carolina) told reporters in Israel on Wednesday as he warned Hamas not to misunderstand Washington’s abstention on the recent United Nations Security Council resolution.

“Hamas can’t believe for a second that Israel would pause the fighting without the return of the hostages,” Graham said.

He spoke just two days after the United States refused to veto a Security Council resolution that called for a pause to the Gaza war but did not condition the temporary cessation of fighting on freeing hostages.

Israel has warned that the US failure to use its veto sent Hamas the message that it doesn’t need to release the remaining 134 hostages, and weakened Jerusalem’s ability to secure a deal for their release.

“The resolution debacle for lack of a better word... will soon be behind us. The one thing that Israel cannot afford is mixed signals,” Graham stressed.

The United States’ position is that there “will never be a ceasefire unless the hostages are released,” he said.

He noted that the wording of the UNSC resolution “created doubt” and that confusion has to be erased.

Israel has a “moral obligation to its people to destroy Hamas” backed by international law, he stated, as he explained that Washington would in the end support an IDF Rafah operation to destroy four Hamas battalions in the southern part of the enclave.

“I think there is disagreement” between Israel and the Biden administration “about how to move forward regarding Hamas,” Graham said.

Biden officials have said they prefer that Israel rely on targeted operations to destroy Hamas rather than engage in a major military campaign. Israel has insisted that the latter option is necessary to destroy Hamas.

“I hope that [this disagreement] can be resolved pretty soon, but I do know this administration agrees [that] to ask Israel not to destroy these battalions is just off the table,” he said.

The United States has Israel’s back to get “this job done,” he stated, telling Israel that when it comes to ousting the terror group from Gaza, “do what you have to do.”

Graham said he would support plans for Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress, noting that the tensions between the two governments were not as “bad as it seems.”

“Israel has to destroy Hamas militarily. There is no hope for peace until you do that. The idea that Israel is somehow doing less than this [or] that Israel is violating international law. I don’t buy that.”

He also dismissed claims that Israel was deliberately starving Palestinians, explaining that no other army in modern-day history has done as much as Israel to provide for enemy civilians during wartime.

“The blood libel accusation against Israel, that they’re using starvation as a weapon of war, I will debate anybody anytime, anywhere about that.”

Graham also stressed that Congress does not support slowing down weapons sales to Israel. He spoke as some Democratic politicians in Washington are pushing for the US to halt those sales altogether.

“There would be a violent reaction in Congress if there was a whiff of any suggestion that we’re slowing down armaments to Israel, which is fighting for its very existence. So I think there will be a bipartisan pushback” should such a step occur, Graham stated.

Graham spoke with reporters on his way to meet with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman to push for a security agreement between Washington and Riyadh that would include a normalization deal with Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Hamas attacked Israel on October 7 to thwart that deal, he said.

As long as Hamas remains in Gaza, it would not be possible to move forward on a normalization deal, Graham said, particularly since it would have a Palestinian statehood component.

The best way forward is for Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab states to “take ownership” of de-radicalizing Palestinian society in the West Bank and Gaza, he said.

This has to include a new governing structure to replace the Palestinian Authority and a new education system that does not incite against Israel and Jews, he added.

“The PA, as it exists today, in my view is not a legitimate partner for the State of Israel,” Graham said.

He also pushed back against those on the Israeli Right who want to rebuild settlements in Gaza.

“Some in Israel would like to occupy Gaza, resettle people in the West Bank,” Graham explained. “As a friend, I do not believe that to be a practical solution that would have much support anywhere.”

'Israel cannot leave Gaza until Palestinian society is reformed'

But at the same time, Israel can’t leave Gaza, until the Palestinian society there is reformed.

“Somebody needs to pull the Palestinian school system up by its roots and destroy it.”

He accused the United Nations Relief and Works Agency which provides food and social services to Palestinian refugees of allowing educational material in their classrooms that incited against Jews and Israel.

The Biden administration, which had been a major funder of UNRWA, halted its financial support of the organization this year after Israel charged that 12 of its staff members had participated in the October 7 attack against Israel.

The United States, he underscored, has no intention of resuming its funding to UNRWA.

“UNRWA as an organization is dead to the United States and the people of Israel. It must be replaced in terms of health care, basic necessities like food, as well as education,” Graham said.

He advocated relying on the World Food Program to distribute food supplies in Gaza.

Graham said he intended to discuss with MBS the Knesset vote against unilateral Palestinian statehood, as he noted that the vote was also a mandate to hold talks on Palestinian statehood through a bilateral agreement.

The Knesset vote, “reinforced the concept of direct negotiations without preconditions,” Graham said.

The unilateral Palestinian statehood option that is being pushed by Great Britain, Canada, and others “is a disaster for Israel” and would be viewed as a step in support for the October 7 attack, the senator stated.

 “You do not want to reward the terrorists for killing Jews,” Graham added.

Even as he touted the US-Saudi defense agreement, he noted that it would include a civilian nuclear program under which uranium would be enriched.

Seven percent of the world’s uranium is in Saudi Arabia, which wants to use that resource in its civil nuclear program for peaceful purposes, Graham stated.

“I’m sure Israel will be very concerned about how that program is set up,” Graham said.

Overall, he said, this deal is so helpful to the region, that he would support it even though it would give a political victory to US President Joe Biden during his reelection campaign.

“I want to be the Republican supporting a deal on your watch,” he said in a message to Biden.

If this agreement is finalized, then “we have a chance to talk about the future of the Palestinians,” Graham said, explaining that in that scenario Israel may have to make some hard decisions.

The Saudi deal, however, won’t prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, and this threat has to be addressed separately.

In a reference to the cross-border violence between Israel and the Iranian proxy group Hezbollah along Israel’s northern border, he noted that the Lebanese Shi’ite terror group had increased its aggression against Israel.

Graham said he planned to introduce a Congressional resolution upon his return to Washington “declaring that any attack by Hezbollah of significance against the State of Israel should be considered an attack by Iran against the state of Israel.”

“It is time for us to go to the heart of the problem,” Graham said.