President Biden will request funding from Congress for Israel and Ukraine in order to “fund America’s national security needs” – an investment he said will “pay dividends for American security,” while warning that both Hamas and Russian President Vladimir Putin seek to “completely annihilate a neighboring democracy.”
The president addressed the nation from the Oval Office Thursday night, a day after he visited with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli officials in Tel Aviv. Biden and Israeli officials discussed the ongoing war, and the humanitarian crisis unfolding in the Gaza Strip.
The president said he will send Congress an “urgent budget request” on Friday “to fund America’s national security needs to support our critical partners, including Israel and Ukraine is a smart investment that’s going to pay dividends for American security for generations.”
The president said the package, if approved, will help to “keep American troops out of harm’s way, help us build a world that is safer, more peaceful and more prosperous for our children and grandchildren in Israel.”
US President Joe Biden delivers a prime-time address to the nation in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Oct. 19, 2023. Biden directly appealed to the American people to support funding for Israel and Ukraine’s war efforts, warning that Hamas and Russian President Vladimir Putin pose parallel threats to US democracy. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“We must make sure that they have what they need to protect their people today,” Biden said. “And always the security package I’m sending to Congress and asking Congress to do is an unprecedented commitment to Israel’s security that will sharpen Israel’s qualitative military edge, which we’ve committed to the qualitative military edge.”
Biden said the funding would help to ensure that the Iron Dome “continues to guard the skies over Israel.”
“That means protecting civilians in combat as best as they can. And the people of Gaza urgently need food, water and medicine.”
The president also spoke to President Abbas of the Palestinian Authority Wednesday and said he “reiterated that the United States remains committed to the Palestinian people right to dignity and to self-determination.”
“The actions of Hamas terrorists don’t take that right away,” Biden said.
President Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu participate in a meeting with Israeli and U.S. government officials, Wednesday, Oct. 18, 2023, in Tel Aviv. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
But while Biden said he is “heartbroken by the tragic loss of Palestinian life,” he stressed that the blast that killed hundreds in a hospital in Gaza “was not done by the Israelis.”
Israel declared war against Hamas after the terrorist group infiltrated the country on Oct. 7, firing thousands of rockets at residential areas and brutally murdering more than one thousand civilians, while taking hundreds of others hostage.
“The terrorist group Hamas unleashed pure, unadulterated evil in the world,” Biden said. “But sadly, the Jewish people know perhaps better than anyone that there is no limit to the depravity of people when they want to inflict pain on others.”
Biden added: “Hamas has a stated purpose for existing: it is a destruction of the state of Israel and the murder of Jewish people.”
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But the president stressed that Hamas “does not represent the Palestinian people.”
“Hamas uses Palestinians civilians as human shields, and innocent Palestinian families are suffering greatly because of that,” Biden said.
At least 4,200 people have been killed in the war on both sides, including at least 1,400 Israeli civilians and soldiers and 31 Americans. Palestinian health authorities say at least 2,808 Palestinians have been killed and more than 10,950 wounded.
More than 30 American citizens have died in Israel and 12 are left unaccounted for.
US President Joe Biden, center, delivers a prime-time address to the nation in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Oct. 19, 2023. Biden directly appealed to the American people to support funding for Israel and Ukraine’s war efforts, warning that Hamas and Russian President Vladimir Putin pose parallel threats to US democracy. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
President Biden visited Israel this week amid its war against Hamas following deadly terror attacks. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)
Meanwhile, the president shifted to Russia’s war in Ukraine.
“History has taught us that when terrorists don’t pay a price for their terror, when dictators don’t pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos and death and more destruction–They keep going,” Biden said. “And the cost and the threats to America and the world keep rising.”
He added: “If we don’t stop Putin’s appetite for power and control of Ukraine, he won’t limit himself just to the Ukraine.”
Biden said Putin has “already threatened to remind, quote, remind Poland that their western land was a gift from Russia. One of his top advisors, a former president of Russia, has called Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, Russia’s Baltic provinces.”
“These are all NATO’s allies. For 75 years, NATO’s kept peace in Europe and has been the cornerstone of American security,” Biden said. “And if Putin attacks NATO ally, we will defend every inch of NATO’s, which the treaty requires and calls for, will have something that we do not seek.”
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Biden said that if the United States walks “away” from Ukraine, and allows Putin to “erase Ukraine’s independence,” the “would-be aggressors around the world would be emboldened to try the same risk of conflict and chaos could spread in other parts of the world, in the Indo-Pacific, in the Middle East, especially in the Middle East.”
Biden warned that Iran is supporting Russia in Ukraine and is also supporting Hamas and other terrorist groups in the region.
“We will continue to hold them accountable,” Biden said.
The president also said that Ukraine has regained more than 50% of the territory Russian troops once occupied, due to the U.S. coalition of more than 50 countries around the globe.
“What would happen if we walked away? We are the essential nation,” Biden said.
US President Joe Biden delivers a prime-time address to the nation in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Oct. 19, 2023. Biden directly appealed to the American people to support funding for Israel and Ukraine’s war efforts, warning that Hamas and Russian President Vladimir Putin pose parallel threats to US democracy. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
The president went on to warn that Putin “has turned to Iran and North Korea to buy attack drones and ammunition to terrorize Ukrainian cities and people from the outset.”
Biden, though, stressed that he “will not send American troops to fight in Ukraine.”
“All Ukraine is asking for is help for the weapons, munitions, the capacity, the capability to push invading Russian forces off their land and the air defense system to shoot down Russian missiles before they destroy Ukrainian cities,” Biden said.
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The president explained that the U.S. funding sends Ukraine equipment “sitting in our stockpiles.”
“When we use the money allocated by Congress, we use it to replenish our own stores, our own stockpiles with new equipment, equipment that defends America and is made in America,” Biden said.
Meanwhile, amid the brutal war between Israel and Hamas, the president pleaded the American people to denounce antisemitism and islamophobia.
“I know we have our divisions at home. We have to get past them. We can’t let petty, partisan, angry politics get in the way of our responsibilities as a great nation,” Biden said. “We cannot and will not let terrorists like Hamas and tyrants like Putin win.”
He added: “I refuse to let that happen.”
The president said that in “moments like these, we have to remember who we are.”
“We are the United States of America. The United States of America. And there is nothing, nothing beyond our capacity if we do it together,” he said.
The funding request, which is expected to be formally rolled out on Friday, is likely to be around $100 billion over the next year. The total figure is expected to include some funding for Taiwan’s defense and for managing the flow of migrants at the southern border with Mexico.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
