After President Joe Biden said that a Palestinian terrorist group was responsible for the strike on a hospital in Gaza on Tuesday, the National Security Council announced that the United States government believes Israel “was not responsible” for the blast.
Adrienne Watson, a representative for the National Security Council, claimed that the assessment was based on “intelligence, missile activity, and open source video and images of the incident.”
According to Watson’s statement released on Wednesday, “while we continue to collect information, our current assessment” is that Israel is not responsible for yesterday’s explosion at the hospital in Gaza based on examination of overhead images, intercepts, and open-source information.
On Wednesday afternoon, the NSC issued a second statement that added weight to its earlier finding. Some Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, according to reports, suspected that a rocket or missile fired by Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) had gone astray and caused the explosion. According to Watson, the militants were still gathering information on the incident.
Israel claims it has recordings of Hamas members discussing the explosion and attributing it to a rocket fired by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ).
Separately, US intelligence officials told AWN that their first investigation points to a rocket fired by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad organisation as the likely source of the attack on the hospital.
An examination of the incident reveals that the hospital was hit by an explosion on the ground, rather than an airstrike, according to one of the sources. The source claims that while there was no obvious crater, the widespread fire damage and dispersed debris were consistent with an explosion that occurred at ground level.
Intelligence agencies have been leaning towards the conclusion that the attack on the hospital was the result of a botched rocket launch based in part on this study.
The intelligence community has increased its intelligence collection resources in the area, so they aren’t simply looking at the blast analysis. According to the officials, US intelligence agencies have not reached a conclusion and are still collecting data.
Officials have said that the initial US conclusion relied on intelligence intercepts provided by the Israelis as well as the blast analysis.
There has been a lack of access to the site and study of the remains discovered, current and former law enforcement authorities in the United States have said. According to one former FBI official, the agency can usually utilise samples from the scene to identify the rocket fuel and explosives used within hours. Without physically inspecting the area, US officials can only establish a strong circumstantial opinion based on signals and other evidence.
Biden blames a “errant rocket” for the explosion.
On Wednesday, shortly after his arrival in Israel, Vice President Biden spoke on who he believed was responsible for the attack on the hospital. Biden informed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu upon his arrival in Israel on Wednesday, “Based on what I’ve seen, it appears as though it was done by the other team, not you.”
When asked what gave him that confidence, Biden replied, “The data I was shown by my Defence Department.”
Later on Wednesday, Vice President Joe Biden reaffirmed that the United States believes the explosion was “the result of an errant rocket fired by a terrorist group in Gaza.”
‘We lament the death of innocent Palestinian lives,’ he continued, referring to the Palestinian people’s suffering. “Like the rest of the world, I was appalled and grieved by the countless lives that were needlessly taken yesterday in a hospital in Gaza. Everything we know so far points to an errant rocket fired from Gaza by a terrorist group. The United States has always been a staunch advocate for safeguarding civilians in times of war, and my heart goes out to the loved ones of those who lost their lives or were injured in this tragedy.
Gazan authorities have blamed Israel for the catastrophic hospital explosion, but the Israeli Defence Forces have claimed that evidence indicates a “failed rocket launch” by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group was to blame.
On Wednesday, a spokeswoman for the Israeli Defence Forces stated that post-explosion footage revealed “no cratering and no structural damage to nearby buildings.”
Here, you won’t find any craters. Nothing breaks in the walls. “This proves it wasn’t an aerial munition that hit the hospital’s parking lot,” IDF spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said during a press briefing on Wednesday. The hospital was not struck on the ground, as evidenced by our overhead film. We can only see evidence of fire in the parking lot, which is outside the hospital.
The US intelligence community, in an effort to make a conclusion, has been evaluating a variety of intelligence, including satellite photos and blast analysis, the people said.
Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT), the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said after a classified briefing on Capitol Hill on Wednesday morning, “I’m not sure the IC is ready to make an absolutely conclusive attribution, but what we’re hearing is consistent with what the president said.”
In a joint statement released on Wednesday, Himes and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner of Ohio said they had received evidence from the Biden administration suggesting the hospital incident “was not the result of Israeli military action.”
In a joint statement, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner of Virginia and ranking Republican Marco Rubio of Florida said they were “confident” the strike was “the result of a failed rocket launch by militant terrorists and not the result of an Israeli airstrike.”
