'Grotesque, barbaric' Hamas terror attacks requires Israel 'winning': Mike Pompeo
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tells 'Hannity' Israel must fight to win against Hamas as explosion rock Gaza.
The Biden administration's foreign "appeasement" and weakness on the world stage helped set the stage for Hamas' terror attacks on Israel, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told FOX News on Monday.
Pompeo called footage of Hamas' kidnappings, rapes and bombings "grotesque [and] barbaric," saying that at least Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears to understand the situation.
"I am just hoping that this [Biden] administration doesn't slow him down," he said on "Hannity." "These are going to be long weeks. They're going to be some pictures that come out of Gaza that are going to be tragic. But make no mistake about it, Prime Minister Netanyahu has the duty to defend his own people in the same way that the United States has that duty."
"We now have Americans held hostage and Hamas, puppet of Iran, is threatening to kill them. They've already killed 11 Americans."
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President Biden, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (AP/Getty)
He said President Biden has failed to specifically warn Hamas what the consequences will be if Americans are further harmed.
Pompeo contrasted the relative silence from the White House to former President Donald Trump's tact following Iran-backed rebel attacks on the United States embassy in Baghdad.
He said America at that time made clear it would be Iran, not the violent "knuckleheads on the ground" in Iraq, who would be held responsible for harm caused to Americans.
Despite warnings from the left that such responses would cause "World War III," Pompeo said nothing of the sort occurred, and neither did it bear out that way when the administration backed out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action {JCPOA) Iran Deal.
"When we moved the [U.S.] embassy [from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem], they said we'd create World War III – No, what has created war here is American appeasement; American weakness. And if we don't stand with Israel, if we don't give them the tools that they need to prosecute this to the end – until Hamas is wiped out and the Iranian regime understands that the Israelis mean business and they have American support – then we will risk even more American lives," Pompeo added.
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When asked about the release of $6 billion to Iran from a South Korean account – now held in custodianship by Qatar – in exchange for American prisoners, in light of the Hamas attack allegedly sponsored by Tehran, Pompeo said it has been "illogical" to consider how the U.S. has in his mind "paid ransom to terrorists."
"It can only be that it's part of the ‘Blame America First’ mantra that we're sort of the problem in the world. You saw this at Harvard's campus today, just so indecent; so grotesque to see Americans supporting Hamas that's carting kids into the Gaza Strip to kill them on live TV," he added.
In addition to such positioning coming out of Harvard, a throng of protesters in New York City waved Palestinian flags and defended the attacks, while a pro-Israel rally was held at Golda Meir Square.
In Congress, members of the left-wing "Squad" described Israel as an "apartheid state" in statements grieving the overall loss of life in the attacks.
Pompeo said it is similarly illogical to understand how Israel could be blamed at all for the attack.
"I have no capacity to comprehend how you could watch what has taken place there and have any idea that the right answer to that is to blame the victims of this tragedy," he said.
"We see reminiscences of what happened in the Holocaust... And for a congressman not to call that out… is fundamentally indecent."
He called on the residents of Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib's Dearborn, Mich. district to "vote her out immediately" after the lawmaker wrote there should be an "ending [to] the occupation and dismantling of the apartheid system" in Israel.
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