US disturbed by Gaza children death but to keep arming Israel
U.S. National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said Tuesday it was “horrible to see” Palestinian children being pulled out of the rubble in the besieged Gaza Strip.
His comments come as ongoing Israeli airstrikes across the coastal enclave and a broadening ground invasion have killed over 10,000 people, mostly women and children.
“It is sad to see, it’s horrible to see the images of young kids being pulled out of rubble and so many of them not making it,” Kirby told reporters at the White House.
Asked if the U.S. placed any restriction on how weapons it provides Israel can be used in Gaza, Kirby said: “We provide security assistance to any foreign nation, including Israel, with the full expectation that those weapons will be used in keeping with the law of armed conflict.”
“That’s no different here for Israel than it is for anybody else,” he said. “We’re going to keep urging them to be as discriminant and careful and cautious as possible.”
Israel launched air and ground attacks on the Gaza Strip following the Oct. 7 incursion by Hamas. At least 10,328 Palestinians, including 4,237 children and 2,719 women, have been killed in Gaza since. In comparison, Israeli casualties remain around 1,400.
Amid the soaring death toll, necessities are increasingly running out in Gaza after Israel imposed a “complete siege” on the enclave that has ground humanitarian aid deliveries to a near halt.
In the month since the war began, just over 500 trucks – what would have constituted a day’s worth of deliveries before the war – have arrived in Gaza.
