WASHINGTON: United States President Barack Obama urged American leaders on Tuesday to withdraw their support to Republican candidate Donald Trump because he was unfit to lead the country.

At a White House news conference, President Obama said that Mr Trump was particularly unacceptable because of what he had been saying about the parents of an American Muslim soldier, Capt Humayun Khan, who died in Iraq in 2004.

“The Republican nominee is unfit to serve as president, I said so last week and he keeps on proving it,” the president said.

“The notion that he was attacked by a Gold Star family (the Khans), the fact that he does not appear to have basic knowledge of critical issues in Europe, the Middle East, Asia means that he is woefully unprepared,” Mr Obama said.

The US president said that this was not just his opinion, but leading Republican politicians had also proved his point with “repeated denunciations” of Mr Trump’s statements.

“If you are repeatedly having to say, in very strong terms, that what he has said is unacceptable, why are you still endorsing him?” he asked.

“This is not a situation where you have an episodic gaffe. This is daily and weekly where they are distancing themselves from statements he is making.”

Directly addressing senior Republican leaders who find Mr Trump’s views unacceptable, Mr. Obama said: “There has to be a point at which you say this is not somebody I can support for president of the United States. There has to come a point at which you say, enough.”

In his strongest denunciation of Mr Trump so far, President Obama said the Republican criticisms of Mr Trump “ring hollow” if they continued to support his bid for the presidency in November.

“There has to be a point at which you say, this is not somebody I can support … even if he purports to be a member of my party. The fact that that has not yet happened makes some of these denunciations ring hollow.”

Published in Dawn, August 3rd, 2016