US, Israeli officials will discuss civilian harm in Gaza in early December, State Department says
Senior U.S. and Israeli officials will hold talks in early December in the first meeting of a new channel requested by Washington to raise concerns over civilian harm in Israel's war in Gaza, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Tuesday, Paralel.Az reports citing Reuters.
Miller said at a press briefing that a first meeting had been scheduled to gather information about incidents involving Israel's use of U.S.-provided weapons that are "a cause of concern or a cause of question." He declined to say where the meeting would take place.
"We take all the information we gather... and feed it into our processes, both our policy making processes and the judgments that we have to make about potential violations of international humanitarian law, and we will continue to do that," Miller added.
Miller declined to say whether the new channel would accelerate U.S. government assessments of potential violations of international law by Israel, and did not commit to any assessments concluding before Biden leaves office on Jan. 20.
"Our work is already moving as quickly as we can possibly make it move, but they are difficult assessments that we have to make," he said.