Growing threat of ISIS back in Afghanistan
Fox News senior strategic analyst Gen. Jack Keane (Ret.) on how the 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal contributed to the ISIS resurgence and the need to allow Israel to continue fighting Hamas.
Fox News senior strategic analyst Gen. Jack Keane (Ret.) joined "America's Newsroom" to call out President Biden's statements on the ongoing war in Israel and the need to allow the Israelis to continue their fight. Keane criticized Biden for recent comments showing "disagreements" with how Israel is conducting the war against Hamas.
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GEN. JACK KEANE: It's unfortunate what has happened here. The disagreements that our president has and his team with Prime Minister Netanyahu and his team and how to conduct this war are now in the public spaces. That is really regrettable. I just wish, frankly, that the president and his team would leave Israel alone here and let them conduct a military operation in accordance with their values and as they see fit. They have taken unprecedented moves to remove the problem that no other military has had, in my memory, of dealing with such a concentration of civilians that are actually in the combat zone inside urban centers. When the sound of the guns come, people normally leave. Hamas doesn't let them leave. The Israelis have moved them away as best as they possibly can. And certainly it's resulted, regrettably, in civilian casualties.
Israeli troops operating in Gaza. (Israeli Air Force )
But the rose has to be pinned. The reason for those casualties is Hamas. We've got this thing twisted and blaming Israel for that. It's not the case. Israel has to finish this. What [Hamas] is about, supported by the Iranians, is making the security situation inside Israel … so vulnerable that people don't want to live there. That's what this is all about. If we let Hamas live again, because we don't destroy the remaining battalions and their leaders, they're going to rearm and re-attack and make the people of Israel vulnerable once again. And that erodes the state of Israel. That's what, they're after: it's destruction. There's not that many millions of Jews that are living there. And they certainly trusted their government and their security forces until October the 7th. And that trust will have to be renewed to regain the trust of the Israeli people, certainly not put it further at risk by not destroying this force.
President Biden on Saturday said that the U.S. doesn’t have a "red line" with Israel over its actions in the war with Hamas that would leave the Middle Eastern country unprotected.
"I am never going to leave Israel," the president told MSNBC’s Jonathan Capehart in a wide-ranging interview. "The defense of Israel is still critical. There’s no red line [where] I’m going to cut off all weapons, so they don’t have the Iron Dome to protect them."
Biden was clarifying a hot mic comment from Thursday night after delivering the State of the Union address in which he was caught saying he planned a "come-to-Jesus" talk with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over his handling of the war.
"He has a right to defend Israel, a right to continue to pursue Hamas, but he must, he must, he must pay more attention to the innocent lives being lost as a consequence of the actions taken," Biden told Capehart.
He said in "his view" that Netanyahu is "hurting Israel more than he’s helping Israel … It’s contrary to what he stands for. I think it’s a big mistake so I want to see a ceasefire."
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Earlier on "Fox & Friends" Monday, Netanyahu pushed back against Biden's criticism of his handling of the war in Gaza, vowing that military operations will continue until Hamas is destroyed.
"We're not getting off the gas," Netanyahu stated.
Fox News' Brie Stimson contributed to this report.
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