Hamas slams US senator for suggesting nuclear attack on Gaza

ISTANBUL

Palestinian resistance group Hamas denounced US Senator Lindsey Graham on Monday for comparing the Israeli war on the Gaza Strip to when the US dropped nuclear bombs on Japan during World War II.

Speaking during an interview on NBC News’ Meet the Press on Sunday, Graham argued that Israel should do whatever it has to do amid its deadly offensive on the Palestinian enclave.

“When we were faced with destruction as a nation after Pearl Harbor, fighting the Germans and the Japanese, we decided to end the war by bombing Hiroshima, Nagasaki with nuclear weapons,” he said. “That was the right decision.”

Hamas termed the US senator’s remarks as “shocking,” indicating “his deep moral decline and the genocide and colonialism mentality that he harbors.”

This mentality also exists “among the US political elite, who align themselves with a fully-fledged genocidal crime committed by the morally free Israeli army against isolated civilians,” it added in a statement.

Hamas said Graham’s comments came “in the context of pledging allegiance to the fascist occupation (Israel), making their proponents complicit in the genocidal war.”

According to Business Insider, the US gives Israel around $3.8 billion in weaponry and defense systems annually.

Last month, US Congress approved a military aid package worth $15 billion for Israel, which includes around $5 billion for replenishing weapon stocks.

Israel has waged a brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip in retaliation for Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack, which killed 1,200 people.

More than 35,000 Palestinians have since been killed in Gaza, the vast majority of whom have been women and children, and over 78,700 others injured, according to Palestinian health authorities.

Over seven months into the Israeli war, vast swathes of Gaza lay in ruins, pushing 85% of the enclave’s population into internal displacement amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water, and medicine, according to the UN.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice. An interim ruling in January said it is "plausible" that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza and ordered Tel Aviv to stop such acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

*Writing by Mohammad Sio in Istanbul