White House Staffers to Biden: “You Are Running Out of Time” on Gaza

A group of White House staffers sent a letter of dissent on Monday over the Biden administration’s decision not to enforce its own ultimatum over the Israeli government’s restriction of humanitarian aid to Gaza. With just weeks until President-elect Donald Trump begins his second administration, the letter is a plea for President Joe Biden to “take simple and immediate action to drastically mitigate the humanitarian crisis.”

“You are running out of time to do the right thing, but decisive action could save precious lives in the next two months,” reads the letter. Twenty “current, full-time employees of the White House,” who were not named for fear of professional retaliation, drafted the letter.

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The Intercept spoke with two senior White House staffers who helped draft the letter, which was directed to Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and a variety of senior policy advisers.

“I’m thinking a lot about the concept of legacy and ending well,” said one of the staffers. “I personally want to be seen as someone who keeps my commitments and want to be part of an administration that keeps its commitments too.”

The letter follows the State Department’s announcement last week that it would not restrict military aid despite Israel’s failure to meet concrete demands issued in October.

In an October 13 letter, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin gave Israel 30 days to take “concrete measures” in light of the “increasingly dire” humanitarian crisis in Gaza. “Failure to demonstrate a sustained commitment to implementing and maintaining these measures may have implications for U.S. policy,” the letter warned.

The most concrete of these demands was that Israel allow at least 350 aid trucks each day into Gaza. But as the 30-day deadline approached, aid groups reported that on average, just 42 trucks were crossing into Gaza per day and sometimes as few as six trucks.

The White House staffers’ letter emphasizes that U.S. law, specifically the Foreign Assistance Act, “requires cessation of security assistance to foreign governments who impede U.S. humanitarian aid.”

But after the 30-day deadline passed without meaningful improvement in the flow of aid, the Biden administration declined to make a finding that the Israeli government was in violation of its legal obligations, with little explanation for its reasoning.

“If government attorneys believe these statutes are not being violated, the public and the executive branch staff deserve a written explanation of their reasoning,” reads one of the demands in the White House staffers’ letter.

It also calls on White House leaders to stop the flow of weapons and to pressure Israel “to halt military operations in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon and enact an immediate, comprehensive, and permanent ceasefire.” 

“I felt like I needed to do something,” another staffer told The Intercept, “as an act of trying to get to the straw that breaks the camel’s back — even if this isn’t it.”