Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), the third-highest-ranking Republican in the U.S. Senate, reportedly delivered a scathing rebuke Friday of Hamas and its defenders, both abroad and within the halls of Congress.
Speaking from the Senate floor, Cotton accused critics of Israel of spreading falsehoods crafted by a terrorist propaganda machine and turning a blind eye to the real source of suffering in Gaza.
“Hamas is on the verge of defeat,” Cotton declared. “So it’s cranked up the propaganda machine once again.”
The Arkansas senator, who chairs both the Senate Republican Conference and the Senate Intelligence Committee, focused his remarks on the terrorist group’s manipulation of international media and its exploitation of humanitarian aid, with the apparent complicity of some in the Senate.
Cotton challenged the widespread narrative that Israel is responsible for starvation in Gaza. “Now Hamas wants the world to believe that Israel has undertaken a campaign of deliberate starvation of the Gazan population,” he said, while pointing out that “Israel has helped bring into Gaza approximately 96,000 trucks containing nearly one and a half million tons of food, 46,000 tons of medical supplies, 60,000 tons of water and around 170,000 tons of shelter equipment.”
He didn’t mince words when criticizing fellow senators who have used images of suffering Gazan children to attack Israel. “‘Gullible’ might be a charitable way to describe their motives,” Cotton said, referencing misleading media coverage that depicts children with disease as victims of malnutrition.
He then presented photographs showing aid sitting in Gaza, undelivered — not for lack of supplies, but because, he argued, Hamas systematically steals and profits from them.
“Time and again, we have seen Hamas terrorists divert shipments to themselves or loot delivery trucks, only to resell the supplies on the black market at outrageous prices,” Cotton charged. “Last year, this terrorist-infiltrated aid system managed by the UN and others allowed Hamas to rake in more than half a billion dollars in profit.”
Cotton highlighted the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a charity created to bypass Hamas’s grip on aid, and noted Hamas has explicitly demanded its dismantling in ceasefire talks.
“Much of this aid… is already inside Gaza; it simply needs to be picked up and distributed,” he said. “But the offer has fallen on deaf ears because Hamas uses humanitarian aid as a tool to fund, facilitate and fight its war.”
Cotton condemned efforts to force Israel into another ceasefire that he said would merely reward Hamas and fuel more violence. “They expect Israel to feed the very people who attacked, raped, and murdered innocent Israeli men, women, and children on October 7,” he said. “Not a few American victims as well.”
Drawing a historical comparison, Cotton challenged the moral double standard applied uniquely to the Jewish state. “I don’t recall from my history lessons… the United States providing humanitarian aid in Germany and Japan in World War II,” he said. “When in the annals of history has the victim of an unprovoked war of aggression ever been held responsible for the nutrition of the aggressor?”
“Put simply, Israel doesn’t have any responsibility to send a single loaf of bread to Gaza,” he added. “I wonder why so many senators, pundits, podcasters and European politicians impose this unique standard on the Jewish nation? Why could it be?”
Yet despite the hypocrisy, Cotton noted that Israel continues to deliver aid even while Hamas hoards it. “Once again, we see very simply and very clearly in this war who is on the side of justice and who is on the side of evil.”
Quoting President Donald Trump, Cotton concluded: “The fastest way to end the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is for Hamas to surrender and release the hostages.”
[READ MORE: Jamie Dimon Changes Tune on Trump Tariffs, Applauds President’s Economic Stewardship]
