On Tuesday, Joe Biden said he’d formally ask Congress to approve military funding for Israel in the coming days, emphasizing: “We stand with Israel. And we will make sure it has what it needs to take care of its citizens, defend itself, [and] respond to this attack.” The sentiment is understandable given the horror of Hamas’s massacre on October 7.

Yet bombing Gaza — a heavily blockaded, densely populated strip of land where “military precision” is impossible and enormous civilian casualties are unavoidable — will not make the situation better. Decimating what is in effect a two-million-person refugee camp will not bring back the Israeli civilian lives lost, nor will it punish the perpetrators of the October 7 attacks. Already, the death toll in Gaza has eclipsed the horrifically high Israeli casualty total.

Unfortunately, the United States’ default position for decades has been to send military aid to Israel at every turn, despite its long record of committing human rights abuses against Palestinian civilians.