An avowedly pro-Israeli US secretary of state danced with soldiers of the Israeli army, a force which over the last four months has killed more than 28,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, mostly children and women, local media said Tuesday.
Mike Pompeo, who served over 2 1/2 years as secretary of state under then-President Donald Trump, was received by soldiers of the Armored Corps' 73rd Battalion in the southern city of Ofakim, according to Israel National News.
As part of Pompeo's brief visit to Israel together with his wife, he danced with the soldiers, who have been accused of taking part in a genocidal campaign against Palestinians.
"I've been to Israel on numerous occasions. But this visit has been the most poignant and the most heartbreaking. What happened on October 7th was so shocking and so sadistic that the trauma is felt constantly, everywhere by everyone,” he said, referring to an attack on Israel by Palestinian group Hamas that killed some 1,200 people.
“And yet, their resilience is truly inspiring. I stand with Israel. I stand with the Jewish people.”
In May 2018, under Trump and Pompeo, the US moved its embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, though Israel's occupation of eastern Jerusalem – the capital of a planned Palestinian state – has never been legally recognized. Pompeo served at secretary of state until the end of Trump's term, when Joe Biden was sworn in as the new president.
Since the cross-border incursion by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7, the Israeli offensive into Gaza has killed more than 28,000 people and caused mass destruction and shortages of necessities.
The Israeli war on Gaza has pushed 85% of the territory's population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which in an interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.
