WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris doesn’t support halting arms shipments to Israel as a way to pressure Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration over the war in Gaza, a top aide to the Democratic presidential challenger said on Thursday.
“She does not support an arms embargo on Israel,” Philip Gordon, Harris’ national security adviser, wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “She will continue to work to protect civilians in Gaza and to uphold international humanitarian law.”
Activists and progressive Democrats have tried to pressure Harris into taking a more assertive stance than President Joe Biden on the war now that Biden has abandoned his reelection effort and Harris is the Democratic presidential nominee.
Some see an opportunity to influence a new Democratic leader after Biden refused to stop weapons shipments to Israel as the war continued — with the exception of blocking one order of 2,000-pound bombs in an effort to shape Israel’s military campaign in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
At a news conference Thursday at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, Republican nominee Donald Trump repeated his assertion that Harris has “been very, very bad to Israel, and she’s been very bad to Jewish people.” Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff, is Jewish.
But while Harris has occasionally used more forceful-sounding rhetoric than Biden on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, the vice president hasn’t deviated from the administration’s broader effort to support Israel against Hamas, which started the war with an attack on Oct. 7 that killed some 1,200 Israelis. Israel’s subsequent offensive has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to health officials in the territory run by Hamas, which is designated a terrorist organization by the US and European Union.
At a campaign rally on Thursday in Detroit, Michigan, Harris was heckled by a group who chanted: “Kamala, Kamala, you can’t hide — we won’t vote for genocide.” Michigan is the U.S. state with the highest percentage of Arab-Americans, many of whom hold deep anger over the administration’s Gaza policy.
Harris put down the hecklers forcefully.
“You know what, if you want Donald Trump to win, then say that — otherwise, I’m speaking,” she said, to loud applause.
With assistance from Akayla Gardner and Hadriana Lowenkron.
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