QUESTION: For the latest on the conflict, we’re joined now by Secretary of State Antony Blinken. We appreciate your time this morning, Mr. Secretary. You had five Democratic senators send a letter to you, the Defense Secretary, the President this week calling for increased accountability for Israel’s use of American weapons. And yet your State Department is now pushing through the sale of 13,000 rounds of tank ammunition for Israel, bypassing congressional review generally required for foreign arms sales. Why are you doing that? SECRETARY BLINKEN: Martha, first, we’re trying to do everything we can to ensure that civilians are protected, that humanitarian assistance gets into people who need it in Gaza. We are deeply, deeply aware of the terrible human toll that this conflict is taking on innocent men, women, and children, and we’re working to minimize that to the greatest extent possible. When it comes to the weapons that we transfer, the rules that go along with them, those rules apply to Israel as they do to any other country, including the way they’re used and the need, the imperative of respecting international humanitarian law. In the case of these particular weapons that you mentioned, Israel is in combat right now with Hamas, a group that viciously attacked it on October 7th; that has said that it – given the opportunity, it will repeat October 7th again and again and again; that continues to launch rockets against Israeli civilians. And we want to make sure that Israel has what it needs to defend itself against Hamas. A small portion of what has been requested is going through on an emergency basis, that is moving quickly so that Israel can have what it needs in hand. But virtually everything else is going through the regular order, through Congress. […]
Click here to visit source. Secretary Antony J. Blinken With Martha Raddatz of ABC This Week