Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) accused Vice President Harris of being “naive” about Iran and blasted the Democratic presidential candidate for not taking a tougher stance against Hamas.
Cotton, a member of the Senate Intelligence, Armed Services and Judiciary committees, said on “Fox News Sunday” that Harris’ policy on Israel over the past 10 months alone was “just one example of why she is not ready to be commander in chief.”
“She was quick to take at face value Hamas’ claims about the numbers killed and their actions,” Cotton said. Death tolls in Gaza are released by the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health, which does not distinguish between combatant and civilian casualties.
“Israel has sometimes had to attack hospitals, schools and other locations that Hamas uses for command and control and to launch mortars and rockets,” Cotton said. “There is no doubt that civilian casualties in Gaza are the fault of Hamas, not Israel. But Kamala Harris, like Joe Biden, has from the start put more pressure on Israel than on Hamas.”
The senators also criticized Harris, who as vice president and presiding officer of the Senate, for joining about 128 other Democrats who skipped Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to both chambers of Congress last month. Harris held a separate private meeting with Netanyahu in his office on the White House grounds while in Washington, D.C.
Biden’s “stop it” remarks and other threats do not appear to deter Iran as it launches more attacks on U.S. bases in the Middle East.
Vice President Kamala Harris at a campaign rally at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas on August 10, 2024. (Rhonda Churchill/AFP via Getty Images)
“She refused to chair a joint session of the Senate, which is her only constitutional duty as president of the Senate, refused to meet publicly with the president, and once again blamed Israel for civilian casualties in Gaza, only to embolden Iran and Iranian-backed terrorists,” Cotton said. “And then two days later, another Iranian-backed terrorist group, Hezbollah, fired rockets into Israel, blowing up children playing ball in a playground.”
“Kamala Harris is naive and not prepared to be commander in chief,” he added.
Speaking after a private meeting with Netanyahu, Harris said Israel has the right to defend itself against terrorist organisations.
“Is that not strong enough for you?” Fox News host Shannon Bream asked Cotton.
Senator Tom Cotton accused Kamala Harris of being “ignorant” about Iran. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
“She always says that, just like Joe Biden, and then she immediately says, ‘but.’ And usually, Shannon, when a politician says ‘but,’ it’s not what comes before the ‘but’ that matters, it’s what comes after it,” Cotton said.
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“And Kamala Harris’ words after the ‘but’ constantly suggest that Israel, not Hamas, is responsible for the suffering of Gaza’s civilians, that it is Israel’s provocative attitude that is waging a defensive war after the October 7 atrocities, and that it is Israel that should exercise restraint rather than supporting Israel and taking a firm stance against Iran and Iran-backed terrorists throughout the region,” he said.
Cotton also sharply criticized Harris’ response to a disruption by anti-Israel protesters.
Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, attend a campaign rally at the University of Nevada, Thomas and Mack Center in Las Vegas, August 10, 2024. (Rhonda Churchill/AFP via Getty Images)
“She’s been interrupted twice now by pro-Hamas extremists. The first time, she accused them of helping Donald Trump get elected, not saying they were crazy to support terrorists, not saying the United States supports Israel, the victims of the worst genocide of the Jewish people since the Holocaust, but accusing them of possibly helping Donald Trump get elected,” Cotton said. “But it was apparently too much for her and her campaign, and the next time she was interrupted, she literally had a manuscript in front of her. She had a piece of paper and she started writing that she sympathized with pro-Hamas extremists.
“She said, ‘I hear you. I hear you. We need an immediate ceasefire,'” Cotton recalled. “Instead of saying we need an immediate ceasefire, she should have said, as Joe Biden should have said all along, we need an immediate Israeli victory.”
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The senator praised the way Israel has handled the war “despite the constraints imposed by Kamala Harris and Joe Biden, and despite operating under a significant arms embargo that Kamala Harris would not say would worsen if she were elected president.”
Cotton added that former President Trump understood that “you can’t have a peaceful and stable relationship in the Middle East without clarity between the United States and Israel and our Arab partners.”
