Details of the sharp phone conversation between President Biden and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

Washington
CNN
—

President Joe Biden laid out several specific things he wants Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to do immediately. Opening the Erez border to northern Gaza and the port of Ashdod in southern Israel to humanitarian aid. The inflow of goods via Kerem Shalom will increase significantly.

A person familiar with Thursday’s phone call paraphrased Netanyahu as responding, “Joe, we’ll do it.”

But Biden wasn’t done yet. The Prime Minister must announce the move that evening, the President insisted.

By Thursday night, the Israeli Security Cabinet had approved these three measures to increase humanitarian aid to the besieged enclave.

The relatively brief phone call between the two leaders this week was the first since October’s Hamas attack on Israel, in which Mr. Biden threatened Mr. Netanyahu with serious consequences if Israel did not change the way it waged the war in Gaza. . Biden has remained steadfast in his support for Israel’s right to self-defense, despite growing political backlash at home, and has questioned how the United States will support Israel if the situation for civilians in the area does not improve rapidly. He warned the Prime Minister that he would reconsider whether he was doing so. In conflict.

The Prime Minister’s Office declined to comment on the exchange. The White House declined to comment on the matter.

In both the White House’s official announcement about the Biden-Netanyahu phone call and the official statement after the call, U.S. officials made it clear exactly what changes to U.S. policy were being considered. is refusing.

A senior administration official told CNN that a recently released national security memorandum that sets standards for foreign governments receiving U.S. military aid to adhere to should slow U.S. arms supplies to Israel. is the most likely policy change, he said.

But the official stressed that no decisions have been made yet and that the question of how the United States will support Israel’s current war is complex. They said there are other avenues the administration could potentially pull, including those related to large-scale military aid and the United Nations, as well as Biden’s public comments regarding the administration’s support for the war. He said this includes things like making major changes to the rhetoric.

Even as the administration considers what changes it might make if Israel does not comply, the U.S. government is still sending deadly weapons to its allies. Biden is expected to greenlight an estimated $18 billion sale of U.S.-made fighter jets to Israel, and his administration also recently approved the transfer of more than 1,000 500-pound bombs and more than 1,000 small-caliber bombs to Israel. CNN reported that. The White House has defended these sales and transfers as the product of a years-long process.

Throughout April, the Biden administration plans to monitor new steps taken by Israel to alleviate the civilian and humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip. But it’s also unclear how exactly Biden will assess Israel’s efforts to get back on track.

U.S. officials have not publicly provided metrics on how much humanitarian aid they are pumping into Gaza per day, and have said the IDF is paying close attention to protecting civilians, including aid workers, in Gaza. There is no mention of how to determine whether there are any.

Government officials said the IDF attack that killed seven World Central Kitchen (WCK) employees on Monday prompted a telephone conversation between the two leaders on Thursday. U.S. officials see the incident, which left a dual Canadian-American citizen dead, as a clear tragedy illustrating the Biden administration’s growing concerns about Israel’s operational strategy.

The Israeli government on Friday shared the findings of its investigation into the killing of the WCK workers, revealing a series of failures in assessment and decision-making. In response, the Israel Defense Forces fired two senior officers and reprimanded the top commander.

White House officials have avoided publicly describing Biden’s request to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week as an ultimatum.

“I think this call was very direct, very businesslike, very professional on both sides,” White House Press Secretary John Kirby told reporters shortly after the call ended. Ta. President Kirby added that the United States had made clear that it was “ready to reconsider our own policy approach depending on what Israel does or does not do.”

The two men, who have known each other for nearly 40 years, have had their relationship put to the test by the Israel-Hamas war, as worldwide condemnation of Israel’s actions grows louder by the day. Both the president and prime minister face angry voters at home, and both could see their political fortunes determined by the outcome of the conflict.

For Biden, the end of the war can’t come soon enough. His support among key voter groups, including Muslims, Arab Americans, progressives and young voters, has declined since October. And wherever Biden goes, he seems to be met with angry demonstrators calling for a permanent ceasefire.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Netanyahu faces political reckoning once the war ends. This moment is very likely to lead to the collapse of his already fragile right-wing coalition.

Biden himself has recently indicated that he believes there will be a rift in his increasingly tense relationship with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and that it is only a matter of time.

The president was caught saying this on a hot mic after delivering his State of the Union address last month. “”

CNN’s Eugenia Ugrinovich contributed to this report.