Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) recently suggested international offices could find Israel’s bombardment of Gaza constitutes as genocide in the enclave.
The Massachusetts Democrat was delivering remarks last Friday at the Islamic Center of Boston in Wayland, Mass. when an audience member asked for her opinion on the International Court of Justice (ICJ) January ruling that found it is “plausible” that Israel is committing genocide in its war with Hamas in Gaza.
“So I think… that what’s happening now is there’s going to be a long and involved debate over what constitutes genocide, when you ask a legal question. For me, it is far more important to say what Israel is doing is wrong. And it is wrong,” per her spokesperson.
Further pressed on if Israel is committing genocide, she said, “If you want to do it as an application of law, I believe that they’ll find that it is genocide, and they have ample evidence to do so.”
Warren’s comments were originally videotaped and posted to X by a GBH News reporter and were later confirmed by her office to The Hill.
“Senator Warren believes that Prime Minister Netanyahu and his right-wing war cabinet have created a massive humanitarian disaster in Gaza and have not taken reasonable steps to protect civilians,” Warren’s spokesperson told The Hill.
The ICJ, the top United Nations judicial body, ruled in January that Israel must do more to protect civilians in the Gaza Strip but did not issue an order demanding a cease-fire in the strip.
More than 33,000 Palestinians have died in Gaza since early October, when Palestinian militant group Hamas launched a surprise assault on Israel, killing about 1,200 people and capturing about 250 others.
During her remarks, Warren said people need to think “past a labels argument.”
“For me, it is far more important to say what Israel is doing is wrong. And it is wrong. It is wrong to starve children within a civilian population in order to try to bend to your will, it is wrong to drop 2000-pound bombs, in densely populated civilian areas,” she said. “I think I can make a more effective argument by describing the behavior that is happening.”
Warren has recently ramped up her criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s wartime campaign and said last week she would move to block the sale of F-15s to Israel after six aid workers and their driver were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza.
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