U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) recently blamed the Biden-Harris administration for policy mistakes that have led to the current surge of violence between Israel and Hamas.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently vowed to move forward with his country's military offensive in the Gaza Strip despite the Biden administration's insistence that Israel lessen its aggressive tone, Yahoo! News reported.
President Biden had previously held back from intervening in the conflict, but international public pressure has been building for Biden to directly push Israel to call for a ceasefire with Hamas leaders.
"Israel is at war. We're just four months into the Biden-Harris administration and we've already seen disasters on the policy front ... we have a shooting war in the Middle East," Cruz said a May 19 video posted on Twitter, "... caused by disastrous political decisions made by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris."
On May 5, the Biden administration notified Congress that it had approved a $735 million arms deal to sell weapons to Israel. A group of Democratic lawmakers led by U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has called for an end to the sale of arms to Israel and has introduced measures in an attempt to block the sale, The Hill reported.
"For decades, the U.S. has sold billions of dollars in weaponry to Israel without ever requiring them to respect basic Palestinian rights," Ocasio-Cortez said in a statement, according to The Hill. "In so doing, we have directly contributed to the death, displacement and disenfranchisement of millions."
Leaders around the world have called for the two sides to come to a ceasefire, but there has been no decrease in the violence, NPR News reported.
"At a time when so many, including President Biden, support a ceasefire, we should not be sending ‘direct attack’ weaponry to Prime Minister Netanyahu to prolong this violence," Ocasio-Cortez said.
Despite opposition, the arms deal is expected to go through.
At least 200 Palestinians and about a dozen Israelis have been killed since the start of the fighting, The Hill reported.