Kamala Harris warns Israel’s pending military assault on Rafah would be ‘huge mistake’ and refuses to rule out major consequences for Netanyahu after he vowed to take fight to Hamas with or without US support

Vice President Kamala Harris warned on behalf of the Biden administration that an Israeli military offensive in Rafah would be a “major mistake” that could have consequences.

Harris told ABC’s ‘This weekSunday that the White House “has been clear in multiple conversations and in every respect that any major military operation in Rafah would be a big mistake.”

The second-in-command said she was “not ruling anything out” in terms of possible consequences for the Jewish state if it were to aggressively invade Rafah – Hamas’s last stronghold in Gaza.

“We’re going to take it step by step, but we’ve been very clear in terms of our perspective on whether that should happen or not,” she said.

Last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu emphasized that the IDF would invade Rafah – a city in southern Gaza bordering Egypt – with or without the support of the United States.

Democratic support in Washington is waning for the Israeli leader, who has taken aggressive military action to eliminate Hamas terrorists in Gaza.

In a video statement, Netanyahu said: “There were times when we agreed with our friends, and there were times when we disagreed with them.

“At the end of the day, we have always done what was necessary for our safety, and we will do so this time.”

He said he had already given the green light to the IDF’s planned operations in Gaza and would soon approve an outline for the evacuation of civilians from the city.

Harris questioned the IDF’s ability to successfully evacuate innocents, saying she has “studied the maps.”

‘Those people have nowhere to go. We are looking at about a million and a half people in Rafah who are there because they were told to go there, most of them,” she said.

But Netanyahu seems unwavering in his position.

Last Friday, he met with the Biden administration’s top diplomat, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, to whom he reiterated his message.

“I told (Blinken) that I hope we would go to Rafah with American support, but if necessary we will do it alone,” he said after the pair met in Tel Aviv.

There are more than a million Palestinians in Rafah who sought refuge from Israeli ground and air attacks that took place further north during the first weeks of the war.

But Netanyahu says that without an invasion of Rafah, Israel cannot achieve its goal of completely destroying Hamas.

Earlier last week, President Joe Biden told Netanyahu during a phone call that he could not support a major military offensive against Hamas in Rafah.

He said his government would support a smaller operation targeting high-value targets within the terrorist organization.

Blinken said Thursday that a major ground attack on the southern Gaza city would be a “mistake” and “unnecessary” for the mission to defeat Hamas.

He made his comments after meeting with a group of top Arab diplomats in Cairo for discussions on ceasefire efforts and Gaza’s post-war future.

Gaza has rejected a number of ceasefire proposals from Israel and the United States, all of which are conditional on the release of the remaining hostages taken on October 7.

Blinken said: “Our position, which is very clear, is that a major military operation in Rafah would be a mistake, something we do not support.”

Despite the Biden administration’s unequivocal stance on Israel’s planned invasion of Rafah, the vice president specifically caught a significant amount of flak following her comments on Sunday.

International security professor Max Abrahams posted on

‘One of the world’s greatest orators AND cartographers. We are so blessed,” wrote RNC Research administrator Jake Schneider, who also mocked the VP.

Conservative columnist Benjamin Weingarten called Harris’ comments a “betrayal” of the US’s only ally and friend in the troubled region.

“The ultimate guide to the Biden administration’s betrayal of Israel,” he wrote.