In response to a journalist’s question about the need to avoid a regional conflict, Biden said, “This should happen. This should really be avoided.”
Biden said he would speak to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, without specifying a date.
Biden added to reporters, “I will tell you what I will tell him when I talk to him.”
Israel said it bombed targets belonging to the Yemeni Houthi group on Sunday, expanding the scope of its confrontation with Iran’s allies in the region after it killed the Secretary-General of the Lebanese Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, on Friday in an escalating conflict in Lebanon.
Israel added that the air strikes on the Yemeni port of Hodeidah came in response to the missile attacks launched by the Houthis on Israel in the past few days, amid fears that the fighting in the Middle East would spiral out of control and Iran and the United States would be drawn into it.
The strikes on Yemen came at a time when Israel launched more strikes on targets in Lebanon, where its intense bombing over two weeks led to the killing of a number of senior Hezbollah leaders and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of residents.
Israel vowed on Sunday to continue the offensive, with IDF Chief of Staff Herzli Halevy saying, “Hezbollah has lost its head, and we must continue to hit it hard.”
The Lebanese Ministry of Health reported that the raids launched by Israel on Sunday led to the killing of 32 people in Ain al-Delb in southern Lebanon and 21 people in Baalbek-Hermel in the east of the country, and indicated that 14 paramedics were killed in air strikes during the past two days.
Hezbollah and Israel have been exchanging fire across the border since the start of the war in Gaza, which broke out after the Hamas attack on Israeli towns on October 7.
The Houthis launched attacks on Israel throughout that period and disrupted navigation in the Red Sea.
Israel intensified its attacks on Hezbollah two weeks ago and said that the aim of these attacks was to secure the return of residents to the northern regions, which led to the killing of a large number of the group’s leaders.
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