Updated at 6:38 p.m.
U.S. Rep. Becca Balint, D-Vt., on Thursday called for a cease-fire in the war between Israel and Hamas — a change in her position that comes more than a month after the conflict erupted.
“What is needed right now is an immediate break in violence to allow for a true negotiated ceasefire,” Balint wrote in a commentary published by VTDigger. “It will be the first step in the difficult and critical work needed ahead — building Israel’s post-war government, determining who will govern the Gaza Strip, and negotiating long-term peace and security for both Palestinians and Israelis.”
According to her spokesperson, Sophie Pollock, Balint is the first Jewish member of Congress to call for a cease-fire. She is also the first member of Vermont’s congressional delegation to do so.
Balint’s written words on Thursday mark a change in her position on the war, which has raged in the Middle East since Oct. 7, when Hamas, in a surprise attack, killed an estimated 1,200 Israelis and abducted hundreds of hostages. Israel has been fierce in its retaliation, bombarding and invading civilian-occupied areas of Gaza, forcing mass evacuations and cutting off electricity, food and water.
According to the Associated Press, as of Thursday nearly 10,000 Palestinians had been killed in Gaza since the start of the war. United Nations officials have said that both Israel and Hamas have committed war crimes, according to CNN.
In an interview with VTDigger on Thursday afternoon, Balint pushed back on the notion that she had reversed her stance, characterizing her commentary instead as “a more complete explanation of my position.”
The shift comes after weeks of increasing pressure from activists calling on her to demand a cease-fire, including from a large crowd of protesters who, last Thursday, marched on a fundraiser she was hosting for her reelection campaign in Burlington.
“It was clear from my last brief visit home to Vermont that Vermonters didn’t have a complete understanding of my position on this very complex issue,” Balint told VTDigger, referring to the Burlington protest, as well as one-on-one conversations she had with constituents.
“I have been clear the entire time that we need to stop the bombing, have a break in the violence, give space for a path forward,” Balint said. “I have said that it’s Israel’s responsibility to protect civilians. I have said repeatedly that, even though Hamas embeds its terrorist and its communication systems in (civilian areas), it’s not OK to bomb densely populated areas. And I’ve said that the United States must use its leverage to make it clear to (Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s) government that this is categorically unacceptable.”
Like her colleagues in Vermont’s congressional delegation, Balint had, until Thursday, called for a “humanitarian pause” in the conflict in order to allow for the delivery of emergency humanitarian aid — including food, water and medical care — to Palestinian civilians in Gaza. But all three members of Vermont’s delegation — Balint and U.S. Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Peter Welch, D-Vt. — had previously stopped short of calling for a cease-fire.
Speaking with VTDigger’s ‘The Vermont Conversation’ podcast in late October, Balint explained her resistance, saying, “If I thought that calling for (a cease-fire) right now would help this situation, would help the hostages, would help the intricacies on the ground, I would do it.”
On Thursday, she maintained to VTDigger that, “from the moment this started,” she has advocated for “stopping the violence.” The debate over whether to say the word cease-fire, she said, “has become an argument over semantics, and that has clouded the fact that we all want the same thing.”
Though Balint has now voiced support for a cease-fire, she has not embraced a resolution put forward last month by her progressive U.S. House colleagues calling for an immediate cease-fire.
“I have not signed on to that particular cease-fire resolution,” Balint said, “because it does not fully address the issues needed, in my opinion, to actually achieve these goals.”
Sanders, who has not called for a cease-fire, also cast doubt on the House resolution’s efficacy in a written statement issued Thursday afternoon. “I wish there was a simple solution to this conflict. There isn’t. Non-binding resolutions that Congress won’t pass can’t do that,” he said.
Referring to Hamas, which has repeatedly called for the destruction of Israel, Sanders said, “I am not quite sure how you negotiate a ceasefire with a terrorist organization that is dedicated to perpetual war.”
Instead, Sanders said, the real power that Congress holds over Israel’s continued warfare lies in the purse strings.
“The way to bring about real change in this horrific situation is to attach conditions to any supplemental spending bill for Israel that comes before Congress,” Sanders said.
Welch, too, raised the possibility of placing conditions on any military aid issued to Israel in a statement Thursday — an idea that, in past interviews with VTDigger, he had dismissed as micromanaging.
“Israel also has an obligation to pursue Hamas in a way that places the highest priority on protecting civilian life, in accordance with the laws of war. The U.S. must hold Netanyahu’s government to this standard,” Welch wrote. “This includes giving serious consideration to the type of aid that Congress provides in any future national security supplemental appropriations package.”
Katharine Shapiro, a founding member of Jewish Voice for Peace-Vermont, helped organize last week’s protest outside of Balint’s campaign fundraiser.
Shapiro told VTDigger on Thursday that she was surprised but thrilled by Balint’s change in stance, calling it a testament to the power of grassroots organizing.
Now, Shapiro said, activists will focus their efforts on Vermont’s two senators. Sanders, she said, “is hard to budge,” whereas Welch “has always been very pallid on this issue, and not said anything of value and anything that has any teeth in it whatsoever.
“We’re gonna say, ‘Becca Balint could do it. Why can’t you?’”
