Updated:2024-10-09 08:38 Views:54
Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday commemorated the anniversary of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack on Israel by planting a pomegranate tree, which she called “a symbol of hope and righteousness” in Judaism, at her official residence in Washington.
In a brief speech, Ms. Harris condemned the attack, in which some 1,200 people were massacred in Israel last year, as an “act of pure evil” and said the scores of hostages remaining in Hamas’s hands should be released. Standing beside her was her husband, Doug Emhoff, the first Jewish spouse of a U.S. president or vice president.
“We must work to ensure nothing like the horrors of Oct. 7 can ever happen again,” she said. “And on this solemn day, I will restate my pledge to always ensure that Israel has what it needs to defend itself, and that I will always work to ensure the safety and security of the Jewish people here and around the world.”
While Ms. Harris did not call for a cease-fire in Gaza during her prepared remarks — as she has in the past — she acknowledged the more than 41,000 Palestinians who have died, according to local health officials, in Israel’s campaign to eliminate Hamas.
“We must work to relieve the immense suffering of innocent Palestinians in Gaza who have experienced so much pain and loss over the year,” she said.
During the vice president’s remarks, protesters could be heard chanting in the background.
The brutality of the Oct. 7 attacks and the mass death and grave humanitarian crisis in Gaza caused by Israel’s response have complicated Democratic efforts to win support from Jewish, Muslim and Arab American voters, groups that have reliably backed the party in past elections.
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