US President Joe Biden will pose some “tough questions” in meetings with Israeli leaders during his visit, the White House said on Wednesday after a strike on a Gaza hospital killed hundreds of Palestinians. White House spokesperson John Kirby told reporters that the US President will meet with Netanyahu and the Israeli war cabinet and seek a sense of Israel’s plans and objectives in the days and weeks ahead.
“He’ll be asking some tough questions, he’ll be asking them as a friend, as a true friend of Israel, but he’ll be asking some questions of them,” Kirby said on Air Force One during the flight to Tel Aviv.
Kirby, however, declined to specify the nature of the questions Biden intended to ask beyond “what their plans are going forward.”
Biden is flying to Israel to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu but a meeting with Arab leaders in Jordan has been postponed following the destruction at the hospital.
Israeli and Palestinian officials blamed each other for the explosion that has resulted in by far the highest death toll in any single incident in Gaza during the latest spate of violence. Gaza officials contend that an Israeli airstrike was responsible for the deaths while Israel insists that a failed Palestinian rocket attack triggered the catastrophic blast.
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad group denied Israel’s claim that it was behind the deadly blast and accused Israel of “trying hard to evade responsibility for the brutal massacre it committed.”
“The accusations promoted by the enemy are baseless,” Islamic Jihad said, adding that the group “does not use places of worship or public facilities, especially hospitals, as military centers or weapons stores.”
The group said details such as “the angle of the bomb’s fall and the extent of destruction it left behind” confirm it was similar to Israeli strikes.
Biden, meanwhile, expressed outrage over the blast and directed his national security team to continue gathering information to gain a clearer understanding of the events leading up to the explosion.
During his visit, Biden is expected to meet with Israeli first responders and families of those who lost loved ones in the bloody Hamas assault or whose family members were taken hostage. Biden will also make public remarks during his visit.
