Joe Biden considers $1bn arms package for Israel

The news comes despite Mr Biden’s relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, being reported to have deteriorated as the war drags on.

He signalled to Mr Netanyahu early in April that he could seek to make US aid to Israel conditional if it did not improve conditions in Gaza, after seven aid workers were killed in an Israeli air strike.

The US has delivered thousands of bombs, tank and and artillery ammunition, precision weapons and air-defence equipment since the war began.

On the same day that the aid workers – who included three British citizens – were killed, the State Department reportedly approved the transfer of more than two thousand bombs to Israel.

Separately, the House of Representatives is set to vote this weekend on a bill that would unlock $26.4 billion in aid for Israel to “defend itself against Iran and its proxies”. Among its provisions are billions of dollars to resupply its Iron Dome air defence system.

Mike Johnson, the House Speaker, announced that a series of foreign aid bills for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan would be brought to the floor following the Iranian attack on April 13.

The House voted 316-94 to advance the bills and set up a vote on Saturday, with Democrats lending their support to push the prospective legislation out of the committee stage.

On Friday, the US imposed a further round of sanctions amid frustration with the escalating violence in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Ben-Zion Gopstein, an ally of Israel’s security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and two organisations fundraising to support settlers accused of violence have had their US assets frozen.

Violence between settlers and Palestinians in the West Bank has increased since Hamas’s terror attack on Oct 7, when the group killed 1,200 people and took 250 people hostage.

More than 400 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed by Israeli forces in the last six months, while a further nine have been killed by settlers, according to the UN.


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