Chuck Schumer calls on Israel to hold new elections during Senate speech

The Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, called on Israel to hold new elections, saying he believed the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, had “lost his way” in the Israeli bombardment of Gaza and a growing humanitarian crisis there.

Schumer, the first Jewish majority leader in the Senate and the highest-ranking Jewish official in the US, strongly criticized Netanyahu in a lengthy speech on Thursday morning on the Senate floor.

In prepared remarks obtained by the Associated Press, Schumer said the prime minister had put himself in a coalition of far-right extremists and “as a result, he has been too willing to tolerate the civilian toll in Gaza, which is pushing support for Israel worldwide to historic lows”.

“Israel cannot survive if it becomes a pariah,” Schumer said.

The speech came as an increasing number of Democrats have pushed back against Israel and as President Joe Biden has stepped up public pressure on Netanyahu’s government, warning that he needs to pay more attention to the civilian death toll in Gaza.

The US this month began airdrops of badly needed humanitarian aid and announced it will establish a temporary pier to get more assistance into Gaza via the sea.

Schumer has so far positioned himself as a strong ally of the Israeli government, visiting the country just days after the brutal 7 October attack by Hamas and giving a lengthy speech on the Senate floor in December decrying “brazen and widespread antisemitism the likes of which we haven’t seen in generations in this country, if ever”.

But he said on the Senate floor on Thursday that the “Israeli people are being stifled right now by a governing vision that is stuck in the past”.

Schumer said Netanyahu, who has long opposed Palestinian statehood, was one of several obstacles in the way of the two-state solution pushed by the US. He also blamed rightwing Israelis, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas.

Until they are all removed from the equation, he said, “there will never be peace in Israel and Gaza and the West Bank”.

Schumer said the US cannot dictate the outcome of an election in Israel, but “a new election is the only way to allow for a healthy and open decision-making process about the future of Israel, at a time when so many Israelis have lost their confidence in the vision and direction of their government”.

It is unclear how Schumer’s unusually direct call will be received in Israel. The next parliamentary elections are expected in 2026 but could be held before then.

Netanyahu’s cabinet is dominated by ultranationalists who share the prime minister’s opposition to Palestinian statehood and other aims that successive US administrations have seen as essential to resolving Palestinian-Israeli conflicts in the long term.

The US vice-president, Kamala Harris, Schumer and other lawmakers met last week in Washington with Benny Gantz, a member of Israel’s war cabinet and a far more popular rival of Netanyahu – a visit that drew a rebuke from the Israeli prime minister.

Gantz joined Netanyahu’s government in the war cabinet soon after the Hamas attacks. But Gantz is expected to leave the government once the heaviest fighting subsides, signaling that the period of national unity has ended. A return to mass demonstrations could ramp up pressure on Netanyahu’s deeply unpopular coalition to hold early elections.