WASHINGTON: More than a third of the US Senate’s Democrats called on President Joe Biden’s administration on Wednesday to take “bold” action towards establishing a Palestinian state, in the latest pushback against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The letter to Biden comes days after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, the country’s highest-ranking Jewish elected leader and longtime advocate for Israel, sent shock waves with a speech criticising Netanyahu’s conduct of the Gaza war and urging new Israeli elections.

Nineteen Democratic senators led by Tom Carper, a longtime ally of Biden from his home state of Delaware, in the letter said that the Middle East crisis had “reached an inflection point” that required US leadership beyond past “facilitation” of Israeli-Palestinian talks.

“As such, we request the Biden administration promptly establish a bold, public framework outlining the steps necessary” to establish a Palestinian state over both the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the senators wrote.

In a letter to President Biden, 19 senators call for a ‘regional peace initiative’

The senators said an independent Palestinian state would be “non-militarised” — a terminology embraced by former president Bill Clinton in his peace push two decades ago — and would both recognise Israel and renounce Hamas, whose bloody October 7 attack in Israel triggered the massive military operation.

The senators called for a “regional peace initiative” that would integrate Israel — an allusion to ongoing attempts to persuade Saudi Arabia to offer normalisation with Israel, the focus of the latest visit to the kingdom by Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

Biden and Blinken have repeatedly voiced support for a two-state solution but did little to advance it before the crisis, aware that Netanyahu and his hard-right government are firmly against the idea.

The senators said they have been “particularly disappointed” by Netanyahu’s “refusal to engage on a path to a Palestinian state.” “The diplomatic steps that you and your administration have taken have been of utmost importance, and we urge you to do even more,” the senators wrote to Biden.

House speaker embraces Netanyahu

Other senators signing the letter included Dick Durbin, the Democrats’ number two, and Chris Coons, the other senator from Delaware and a Biden confidant. Schumer’s name was not on the letter but he also voiced support for a two-state solution in his speech.

Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, has built close relations with the rival Republican Party, whose presumptive nominee to challenge Biden in November, Donald Trump, staunchly backed Israeli positions during his time as president.

Speaker Mike Johnson, the top elected US Republican, said he spoke with Netanyahu at length by telephone on Wednesday and expressed “strong disagreement” with Schumer’s speech.

“We think it is not only foolhardy, it’s dangerous for him to be trying to suggest how Israel should run its domestic affairs in the midst of their conflict,” Johnson told reporters afterward.

Netanyahu in a CNN interview on Sunday called Schumer’s speech “totally inappropriate,” saying Israel was not a “banana republic.”

Published in Dawn, March 21st, 2024