‘It’s Just Wrong’: Biden Says He Will Withhold Weapons If Israel Invades Rafah

Jeremy Childs
·2-min read

President Joe Biden said that the U.S. would stop supplying weapons to Israel if the country proceeds with its siege in Rafah, where the majority of Gaza’s civilian population remains sheltered.

Biden addressed the issue in an interview with CNN’s Erin Burnett on Wednesday evening, saying he supported Israel’s security but drew the line at arming the country for an invasion in Rafah.

“It’s just wrong,” Biden said. “We’re not gonna supply the weapons and the artillery shells used.”

The Biden administration confirmed earlier on Wednesday it had paused a shipment of 2,000-pound U.S. bombs that had been authorized for Israel because of ongoing concerns that the bombs would be used in Rafah.

The move is the first time Biden has blocked U.S. arms from Israel, as he has explicitly warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu against an offensive into Rafah on multiple occasions, given the high likelihood of excess civilian casualties.

“They’re not going to get our support if, in fact, they go into these population centers,” Biden said later in Wednesday’s interview.

Rafah, a city near the southern border of Gaza, currently houses over one million Palestinians, many of whom have been displaced from other parts of the region due to the ongoing siege by Israel in the wake of Hamas’s attack on Oct. 7, 2023. Despite Hamas agreeing to a ceasefire deal over the weekend, Israel rejected a deal in favor of a long-planned assault on the city.

Over the course of the past seven months, Israel’s military actions in Gaza have killed over 34,000 Palestinians, according to data from the Gaza Ministry of Health. The brutal assault has destroyed widespread infrastructure within the Palestinian territory, leading to concerns of famine in northern Gaza.

More from Rolling Stone

Best of Rolling Stone

  • Up next
  • Up next
  • Up next
  • Up next

Latest stories

  • Trump appears to freeze for 30 seconds on stage during NRA speech

    Biden and Trump campaigns continue to trade barbs over accusations candidates are senile

  • Biden Camp Has a Field Day With Wobbly Trump at Podium

    XThe Biden campaign gleefully turned one of Donald Trump’s favorite digs against him on Saturday, branding the 78-year-old candidate as woefully geriatric in response to his embarrassing stumble at a Minnesota rally on Friday.Video from the event shared by Biden-Harris HQ on X showed Trump grabbing the lectern during his remarks on stage, after nearly toppling the podium over.A feeble Trump nearly falls down on stage after he leans on his podium too hard and then goes on an angry rant calling hi

  • Trump Ends NRA Speech With ‘Horror’ Warning Set to Dramatic QAnon Music

    Justin Sullivan/Getty ImagesDonald Trump followed up his endorsement by the National Rifle Association on Saturday with a speech stoking fears of the government under Joe Biden “coming for your guns,” and a bizarre monologue set to dramatic music resembling a song favored by QAnon.Addressing thousands of members of the NRA at their annual meeting in Texas, the former president stuck to his usual talking points, hailing the reversal of Roe v. Wade as an “amazing thing,” comparing himself to Al Ca

  • Johnson’s Trump trip unsettles some Republicans: ‘Tell me this isn’t so’

    Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) decision to appear this week at former President Trump’s hush money trial in Manhattan is sparking new blowback from some House Republicans, who are questioning why he would inject himself so prominently in a case involving an alleged affair with a porn star. These Republicans, who requested to speak anonymously to…

  • Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi missing after helicopter crash in heavy fog

    Forty rescue teams have been scrambled to find the missing aircraft in a border area

  • Stefanik Rages at Fox News Host For Bringing Up Her Past Trump Hatred

    Anna Moneymaker/GettyRep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) attacked Fox News Sunday host Shannon Bream on Sunday after Bream brought up a December 2022 New York Times article that chronicled Stefanik’s transformation from a moderate Republican to a Donald Trump acolyte—one that cited Stefanik’s own public comments attacking Trump.Bream noted the article’s use of Stefanik’s former friends and its reference to a radio interview Stefanik gave in 2015, where she described Trump as “insulting to women,” to ask

  • Rudy Giuliani served Arizona indictment papers for election fraud scheme at 80th birthday party

    Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani was served a patriotic-themed birthday cake during his 80th birthday party in Palm Springs, California, Friday night — then served with a notice of indictment related to an alleged scheme to overturn the 2020 election results in Arizona. Giuliani was indicted last month alongside 18 other allies of former President Donald Trump in connection with their ...

  • A Paralegal’s Steely, Star Turn at Donald Trump’s Trial

    Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/New York County District Attorney's OfficeShe had a simple job at a complex trial: Read a man’s damning words.Not just any man, of course. The Twitter posts on the bright courtroom screens at Donald Trump’s New York trial last Friday were the thoughtless intimidation tactics of the first American president to face criminal charges, in a fight that could alter the course of world history.The task fell to Georgia Longstreet, a tall, unassuming 24-year-old who

  • Ukrainian soldiers reveal how they were secretly moved ahead of new Russian invasion

    Members of a Ukrainian brigade have described how they were secretly relocated to help defend a section of the country's border with Russia a few days before a new invasion began. The commander of an artillery unit from 57 Brigade said his guns were even firing at Russian troops the day before the ground incursion into the northeastern region of Kharkiv, which started on 10 May. He said the forces had been "brazenly" amassing on the Russian side of the border. The commander of a second artillery unit similarly confirmed the brigade had been moved early to bolster defences in this direction.

  • Taiwan's steely leader rewrote the book on how to deal with China

    Taiwan's outgoing president says boosting her country's military was the only way to defy China's threat.

  • Poland invests €2.2 billion in reinforcing its border with Russia and Belarus

    Poland is investing approximately €2.2 billion to enhance security and deterrence along its border with Russia and Belarus, Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced on Saturday.

  • Wreckage of Iran President’s Helicopter Seen, State Media Says

    (Bloomberg) -- Iranian emergency crews have seen wreckage of President Ebrahim Raisi’s helicopter that crashed in the nation’s mountainous northwest region, state media reported.Most Read from BloombergWreckage of Iran President’s Helicopter Seen, State Media SaysSpeedier Wall Street Trades Are Putting Global Finance On EdgeEven If Alito Is Right, the Upside-Down Flag Was WrongGantz Says He’ll Quit Unless Netanyahu Moves to New War PlanChina-Bound Oil Tanker Hit by Houthi Missile in Red Sea, US

  • Teachers could get protection against blasphemy claims under new laws

    The report has been influenced by recent blasphemy cases, which has seen some teachers forced into hiding

  • Search and rescue efforts underway after helicopter carrying Iran’s President Raisi has ‘hard landing’

    Search and rescue efforts are underway in Iran after a helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi suffered a “hard landing,” state news media reported Sunday. Raisi was traveling in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province, returning from a ceremony to open a dam on Iran’s border with Azerbaijan when the helicopter crashed while landing in the Varzaqan region,…

  • New Caledonia 'under siege' from rioting, says capital's mayor

    Hundreds of French gendarmes are trying to secure the road from Nouméa to the airport, officials say.

  • Mainland China hits EU, US with anti-dumping probe into chemical imports, with Japan, Taiwan also targeted

    Beijing launched an anti-dumping investigation on Sunday into imports of a widely used engineering chemical from the EU, US, Japan and Taiwan, as tensions rise with the major trading partners. The commerce ministry move targeting polyformaldehyde copolymer follows a slew of anti-subsidy and anti-dumping probes into Chinese products by the European Union, the latest launched just days ago, and Washington set to slap yet another round of tariffs on Chinese new energy products citing similar reason

  • Russian forces use border-town captives as ‘human shields,’ Ukrainian officials say

    Russian forces have captured dozens of civilians in the border town of Vovchansk, a Ukrainian official has said, with a top regional police officer accusing them of using the captives as “human shields.”

  • Rep Crockett has no regrets about slanging match with Marjorie Taylor Greene: ‘MAGA doesn’t respect rules’

    The Texas Democrat stood by her viral ‘bleach blond, bad-built butch body’ comments

  • Georgian President Zurabishvili vetoes controversial 'Russian law'

    Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili on Saturday put a mostly symbolic veto on the "foreign influence" law that sparked unprecedented protests and warnings from Brussels that the measure would undermine Tbilisi's European aspirations. Ruling Georgian Dream party lawmakers voted through the legislation this week in defiance of protesters, who are worried the ex-Soviet republic is shifting away from a pro-Western course back toward Russia. The move has sparked a wave of protests unprecedented in

  • Ukraine launches 'co-ordinated strikes' against glide bomb Russian airbase - military source

    Ukrainian forces have launched "co-ordinated strikes" against an airbase in southern Russia that is used to unleash glide bomb attacks on Ukraine, a military source has said. The operation, which took place overnight on Saturday, had "significantly reduced" Moscow's ability to use glide bombs against frontline Ukrainian positions, according to the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The Ukrainian military source claimed this would "seriously impact" a Russian attempt to advance on the battleground town of Chasiv Yar, in the east of Ukraine.