US pauses weapons shipment to Israel as assault on Rafah steps up

The United States has paused a large shipment of weapons to Israel, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Wednesday, amid ongoing concerns in Washington about Israeli military operations in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

"We're going to continue to do what's necessary to support Israel," Austin said, calling Washington's security commitment "ironclad."

However, he said that "one shipment of high-payload munitions" had been halted, publicly confirming reports this week in US media, and that other pending near-term assistance was being assessed.

Across Washington, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller also called into question other deliveries.

"We have paused one shipment of near-term assistance and we are reviewing others," Miller told reporters. He refused to comment on the type of military aid and the length of the interruption.

"I don't have a time frame to offer you but we have always made clear that our policy determinations are depending on Israel's policy determinations," he said.

Miller said it had been clearly communicated that the US government did not support Israel's long-threatened all-out offensive in Rafah, the southern city in the Gaza Strip that is seen as the last place of refuge for civilians.

He said the Israeli side has yet to present a credible plan that guarantees both the protection of the civilian population in Rafah and their access to humanitarian supplies.

Israel describes Rafah as the last major Hamas stronghold in Gaza.

Meanwhile US President Joe Biden threatened Israel with further restrictions on the supply of military equipment were it to carry out a major military offensive in Rafah.

"I made it clear that if they [Israel] go into Rafah... I'm not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities," Biden told broadcaster CNN in an interview, stressing "they haven't gone in Rafah yet."

"They haven't gone into the population centres. What they did is right on the border," Biden told CNN's Erin Burnett in an exclusive interview on "Erin Burnett OutFront," broadcast on Wednesday evening.

Biden said that he "made it clear" to Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his war cabinet "they are not gonna get our support if, in fact, they go into these population centres."

"We're not walking away from Israel's security. We're walking away from Israel's ability to wage war in those areas," Biden told Burnett.

"We're going to continue to make sure Israel is secure in terms of Iron Dome and their ability to respond to attacks that came out of the Middle East recently," he said. "But it's, it's just wrong... we're not going to supply the weapons and artillery shells."

On the ground on Wednesday, the military wing of the Palestinian Islamist organization Hamas said they had fired at Israel's Kerem Shalom border crossing - the third time within a few days that al-Qassam Brigades has done so.

The important border crossing for the delivery of aid to the Gaza Strip had only just been reopened on Wednesday after being closed to humanitarian transports on Sunday following a rocket attack by Hamas that killed four Israeli soldiers.

Despite the Israeli announcement that Kerem Shalom was open, no aid had been delivered to the Gaza Strip by Wednesday evening, according to UN spokesman Stéphane Dujarric in New York. He did not respond in detail to questions about what was holding up the deliveries.

No aid had reached the Gaza Strip via the Rafah border crossing either, where fuel in particular is urgently needed, he said.

Meanwhile the top US intelligence officer was in Israel to try to get a deal with the government there.

CIA chief William Burns spoke with Netanyahu in a meeting attended by Burns' Israeli counterpart, head of Mossad David Barnea, Israeli media reported.

Burns is on a whirlwind shuttle diplomacy mission, travelling between Egypt, Qatar and Israel to try to get Hamas to release the hostages it has from Israel in exchange for Israel releasing Palestinian prisoners in its custody.

In Gaza, at least 36 Palestinians have been killed within 24 hours in Israeli attacks and fighting in Rafah, the Kuwait Hospital in Rafah said on Wednesday. These included children who were killed in an airstrike on their home. The Israeli army had reported that Hamas terrorists had been killed in various battles in Rafah.

The Hamas-controlled health authority spoke of 55 deaths within 24 hours in the entire Gaza Strip. Since the beginning of the war, 34,844 people have been killed in the coastal strip. The figures cannot be independently verified, but are viewed as largely credible by the UN and human rights organizations.

According to witness reports, fierce Israeli attacks in Rafah continued on Wednesday. Numerous people continued to flee northwards from the city on the border with Egypt. A central road on the Mediterranean was overcrowded with refugees, witnesses reported.

The Palestinian territory has been the target of a massive Israeli air and ground offensive since the October 7 attacks led by Hamas, which killed 1,200 in southern Israel. Hamas took more than 200 people hostage, some of whom have been released. It is unclear how many of the remaining hostages are still alive.