Far-left Squad member Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo., rejected Israel’s “four-hour pauses” of military operations in Gaza as insufficient before doubling down on her claim that Israel is engaging in “ethnic cleansing” of Palestinians.
Addressing reporters at a rally in Washington, D.C., on Thursday that featured U.S. military veterans calling for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, Bush demanded that Israel “stop the bombing” entirely.
“The idea that we get a break for four hours, a break so that we can have food. I saw someone spoke about it and they said, ‘Thank you for giving us raisins for a few hours. And then do we go back to bombing?’ So, absolutely not four hours,” Bush said.
“I never personally called for [a] humanitarian pause, and I’m not going to call for a humanitarian pause, and I don’t want to see, even though that is what’s happening, a four-hour-a-day humanitarian pause because what we need is to stop the bombing,” she continued.
‘SQUAD’ MEMBER CORI BUSH ACCUSES ISRAEL OF ‘ETHNIC CLEANSING’ INW AR AGAINST HAMAS
“No four hours. We don’t want four hours. We don’t want 16 hours. We don’t want 22. We want a cease-fire now.”
Earlier, the White House said Israel would begin to implement four-hour pauses in military operations in northern Gaza to give civilians time to flee and allow humanitarian aid to be delivered to Palestinians inside the territory.
“We understand that Israel will begin to implement four-hour pauses in areas of northern Gaza each day, with an announcement to be made three hours beforehand,” Kirby said Thursday.
“We have been told by the Israelis that there will be no military operations in these areas over the duration of the pause and that this process is starting today,” he said.
ISAREL TO BEGIN ‘4-HOUR PAUSES’ OF MILITARY OPERATIONS IN NORTHERN GAZA, THE WHITE HOUSE SAYS
Kirby also said Israel was opening a second corridor for civilians to flee the areas that are the current focus of its military campaign against Hamas.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected calls for a cease-fire in Gaza unless hostages are released by Hamas, but said during an interview this week that he would consider “tactical little pauses.”
“It’s not sufficient,” said Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa. “A pause that doesn’t take into account that there are still 2 million people who are being collectively starved, dehydrated, that there are no functional hospitals right now which would allow for humanitarian aid, any humanitarian aid to be applied. It falls short of the standards that this country has agreed to, that other countries throughout this world has [sic] agreed to.”
Several veterans who spoke at the rally condemned Israel’s military action in Gaza, citing casualty figures provided by the Hamas-led health ministry, which claims more than 11,000 people have been killed by the Israeli offensive since the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks. Israel declared war against Hamas after terrorists infiltrated the country, slaughtering more than 1,400 Israelis, mostly civilians, and taking some 240 people hostage.
Asked how Israel should respond when Hamas says they will not stop terrorist attacks until all the Israelis are dead, Bush said, “There’s no military solution to this.”
“We can’t bomb our way to peace,” she said, emphasizing that a cease-fire is the only way for diplomatic negotiations to resume.
“Did bombing get rid of the Taliban?” Bush asked, addressing her critics. “How also do you think that you can bomb a whole people? Kill a whole people?”
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Pointing to the U.N. definition of ethnic cleansing, Bush said “ethnic cleansing” in Gaza is happening now “before our eyes.”
“We need liberation now. We need to free Palestine. Now we need to end the siege.”
Fox News Digital’s Brooke Singman contributed to this report.