Harris: It’s important to distinguish between Israeli people and government

US Vice President Kamala Harris indicates the US will not end its support to Israel amid the Biden administration’s mounting frustrations with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the Gaza war, saying it is important to distinguish between the Israeli government and the people.

Speaking in an interview with CBS, Harris was asked if the US could end aid to Israel over the growing number of Palestinian casualties and a failure to get enough humanitarian assistance into Gaza, following US President Joe Biden’s comments picked up on a hot mic that he was going to have a “come to Jesus” meeting with Netanyahu.

“On this topic, I think it is really important to distinguish  — and there are a lot of feelings rightly based on the horror of what has happened. October 7, 1200 people slaughtered, many young people who were just attending a concert, women were horribly, horribly abused and raped, rape being a tool of war, and then you look at what’s been happing with the humanitarian crisis in Gaza which again, the horrific images which were are seeing come out of there — I think it is important to distinguish, or at least not conflate, the Israeli government with the Israeli people,” Harris says.

“The Israeli people are entitled to security as are the Palestinians in equal measure,” she says.

Vice President Kamala Harris talks to CBS News about the Israel-Hamas conflict, President Biden's State of the Union address, the bipartisan TikTok bill, IVF protections and Roe v. Wade.

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— CBS News (@CBSNews) March 8, 2024