U.S. President Biden reiterates support for Israel, calls on Congress to approve more military aid

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American citizens are currently being held hostage by Hamas, U.S. President Joe Biden confirmed, as he forcefully reiterated his government’s support for Israel and called on Congress to step up military aid. In a White House address Tuesday that could portend the country getting more deeply involved in the war, Mr. Biden also updated the total number of Americans killed in Hamas’s attack to 14.

The President, in his strongest comments since Hamas’s initial incursion into Israel on Saturday, described the killings as “an act of sheer evil” by a group “whose stated purpose for being is to kill Jews.”

“Let there be no doubt: the United States has Israel’s back. We will make sure that the Jewish and democratic state of Israel can defend itself, as we always have. It’s as simple as that,” Mr. Biden, flanked by Vice-President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, told reporters. “These atrocities have been sickening.”

There are at least 20 U.S. citizens missing in Israel, the White House said in a briefing Tuesday. It was not immediately clear how many of them were among the people kidnapped by Hamas and taken to Gaza, the Palestinian enclave controlled by the Islamist group. “As President, I have no higher priority than the safety of Americans held hostage around the world,” Mr. Biden said.

Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said U.S. special forces are working with Israel on intelligence operations as they determine how to free the hostages. “We also have the ability to rapidly deploy other resources into the region,” he told reporters as he travelled to Brussels for Ukraine-related meetings.

The U.S. State Department said Mr. Blinken will be in Israel and Jordan from Wednesday to Friday to discuss ways of shoring up Israel’s security.

Israel-Hamas war so far: What to know about the attack, casualties, hostages and the response

Israel has said more than 1,200 Israelis were killed and 200 kidnapped in Hamas’s attack, while Israeli forces killed 1,500 members of Hamas. Palestinian authorities, meanwhile, have said Israel’s retaliatory air strikes have killed 900 people in Gaza, including 260 children.

The U.S. has provided ammunition to Israel since the attack and helped replenish the missiles in the Israeli Iron Dome defence system. Mr. Biden suggested he would soon be asking Congress to fund more such military aid. On Tuesday, the President had his third conversation since the attack with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“It’s about the security of our world, the security of the United States of America,” he said. Mr. Biden did not say if help for Israel would be tied to a separate military aid package for Ukraine, which is stalled in the House of Representatives amid Republican infighting that has left the chamber without a speaker.

Mr. Biden said he had discussed the importance of acting “according to the rule of law” with Mr. Netanyahu. “Terrorists purposefully target civilians, kill them. We uphold the laws of war, the law of war. It matters. There’s a difference,” he said.

“Hamas does not stand for the Palestinian people,” Mr. Biden added.

Even as the Biden administration ramps up its involvement in the war, it is signalling that it hopes to keep the conflict from spreading. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told a news conference that U.S. moves to scramble warships and fighter jets to the area were meant to “send a clear message of deterrence.” Six U.S. ships, including the world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, arrived Tuesday in the eastern Mediterranean.

Mr. Sullivan also said U.S. intelligence had no idea Hamas’s attack was going to happen and currently has no evidence that Iran planned or ordered it. “While Iran plays this broad role – sustained, deep and dark role – in providing all this support and capabilities to Hamas, in terms of this particular, gruesome attack on Oct. 7, we don’t currently have that information,” he said.

The U.S. is not cutting off or reviewing the hundreds of millions of dollars in humanitarian and development aid it gives annually to Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, after moves by Austria and Germany to suspend or reconsider their own aid. The U.S.’s aid is used for everything from food and water to helping develop businesses.

The United Nations said Israeli air strikes, combined with moves to cut off the territory’s electricity and food supplies, have made it harder to treat injured people there. Health facilities have been bombed, and about 200,000 Gazans have been forced from their homes, the organization said.

With a report from the Associated Press