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U.S.: If Hamas Cared about Palestinian Civilians, They Would Surrender
(State Department) U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller was asked about Palestinian casualties in Gaza on Monday. He responded: "You have to step back and remember that the Israeli military is one of the most professional militaries in the world. They have legal determinations that they make when conducting strikes. They go through procedures where they weigh civilian harm when they conduct any of these strikes. They have put in place these plans...to evacuate specific neighborhoods to keep civilians out harm's way rather than just telling an entire population to move. So they are going about this with a certain degree of deliberateness to try to minimize civilian harm." "The underlying problem of this entire situation...is that Hamas has embedded itself inside civilians - inside civilian homes, inside its mosques, in schools....It is Hamas that is putting these civilians in harm's way....I'm surprised I don't hear more people saying, why doesn't Hamas lay down its arms? Why doesn't Hamas move out of schools? Why doesn't Hamas take additional steps to protect civilians? Because we think they should." "We would welcome Hamas laying down its arms and surrendering at any point....They have sufficient firepower to have killed 1,200 people on October 7. So don't tell me that Hamas can't lay down their arms and take additional steps to protect civilians, let alone moving out of all the areas that are putting Palestinian civilians in harm's way. They absolutely can. They could do it today if they cared at all about civilian life." "We support Israel's right to continue to take action to ensure that Hamas can never conduct terrorist attacks like it did on October 7 again....When you look at all of the atrocities that Hamas carried out on October 7 and the atrocities that they've carried out since, the fact that they continue to hold women hostages, the fact that they continue to hold children hostages, the fact that it seems one of the reasons they don't want to turn women over that they've been holding hostage and the reason this pause fell apart is they don't want those women to be able to talk about what happened to them during their time in custody - certainly there is very little that I would put beyond Hamas when it comes to its treatment of civilians, and particularly its treatment of women."