Netanyahu needs to consider his legacy, Chris Coons says

Sen. Chris Coons said Sunday that the legacy of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could be to damage the long-standing relationship between the United States and Israel.

Speaking on ABC's "This Week," the Delaware Democrat said of the longtime Israeli leader: "Right now his legacy is the huge, strategic and defensive failure of October 7th and his legacy could be a real gap, a break in the long, strong, bipartisan, strategic relationship between the United States and Israel. I think that would be tragic."

Coons, one of President Joe Biden's closest allies in the Senate, added of Netanyahu: "His legacy could instead be achieving regional security and peace for Israel."

Biden has paused the transfer of certain weapons to Israel to limit the ability of Israel to launch a full-scale attack on Rafah, a Hamas strong point that also has more than 1 million civilians in Gaza.

Coons explained to host Martha Raddatz the needle that Biden is trying to thread there.

"What matters, Martha, is whether the next stage of this conflict against Hamas, which Israel has every right to carry out, allows for civilians to get out of the way of any future attack on Rafah," Coons said. "And that’s what President Biden has said now publicly, as well as privately, to our trusted ally, Israel."

The senator also said that Hamas, which continues to launch strikes on Israel, is responsible for the war now under way.

"I do think it bears repeating every time we talk about this, that Hamas started this conflict and Hamas, and their conduct, has largely driven the humanitarian crisis that continues in Gaza," Coons told Raddatz.