South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham demanded Sunday that President Joe Biden 'give Israel the bombs they need' in a rant where he said the U.S. made the 'right decision' by dropping nukes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Graham appeared on Meet the Press with NBC's Kristen Welker and it got heated when she continued to press the Republican on why Israel couldn't be more precise in its efforts to destroy Hamas.
This week the Biden administration paused one shipment of bombs to Israel, as the president warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to mount a ground invasion into Rafah, where more than 1 million Palestinian civilians have sought refuge.
'So when we were faced with destruction as a nation after Pearl Harbor, fighting the Germans and the Japanese, we decided to end the war by bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki with nuclear weapons,' Graham said. 'That was the right decision.'
'Give Israel the bombs they need to end the war they can't afford to lose and work with them to minimize casualties,' he added.
South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham's appearance Sunday on Meet the Press got heated when he was pressed by host Kristen Welker on why Israel couldn't be more precise in its efforts to end Hamas
A boy looks on as Palestinians prepare to flee Rafah after Israeli forces launched a ground and air operation in the eastern part of the southern Gaza city. President Joe Biden stopped a bomb shipment to Israel over concerns about operations in Rafah
Welker then interjected.
She pointed out that 'senior military officials would argue that there has been so much technology since those bombs were dropped that for that very reason that is why Israel and other developed countries can be more precise.'
The NBC anchor also pointed out that in 1982, Republican President Ronald Reagan halted arms being sent to Israel as the U.S. looked into whether Israel violated the law and other agreements in its use of cluster bombs near Palestinian civilian populations.
Welker said to Graham, 'Well, historians would say, "Why is it OK for Reagan to do it and not President Biden?'" - a question that set the Republican senator off.
'Well, why's it OK - well, can I say this?' Graham said, when Welker interrupted. 'Why is it OK for America to drop two nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end their existential threat war? Why was it OK for us to do that? I thought it was OK.'
'To Israel, do whatever you have to do to survive as a Jewish state,' he stated.
Welker, again, pointed out that senior military officials have said that the technology has changed.
The rubble that was left after the United States bombed the Japanese city of Hiroshima in 1945, which brought an abrupt end to World War II. Kristen Welker pointed out that modern technology should allow Israel to be more precise in rooting out Hamas in Gaza
WATCH: Sen. @LindseyGrahamSC compares the Israel-Hamas war to WWII:
“Why did we drop two ... nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki? To end a war we couldn’t afford to lose. ... That was the right decision. ... Israel, do whatever you have to do to survive as a Jewish state.” pic.twitter.com/MGJaLTQEkW
'Yeah, these military officials that you're talking about are full of crap,' Graham snapped, as Welker talked over him.
Graham slapped around the American ultra-left - especially Vermont's progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders, who had just appeared on the program - for largely being concerned with the plight of Palestinian civilians in the aftermath of Hamas' brutal October 7 attack on Israeli civilians.
Durnig his segment Sanders told Welker: 'Israel has ... gone to war against the entire Palestinian people, and the results have been absolutely catastrophic.'
'My problem is not with the weapons that Israel is using. My problem is with the tactics Hamas is using,' Graham said, noting how the terror group Hamas has purposely embedded itself into the Palestinian civilian ranks.
'And the idea that America would not send a nickel of aid, echoed by a United States senator, when all the Jews are trying to be killed by radical Islamic groups tells us where we are as a nation,' the South Carolina lawmaker said. 'The Republican Party is with Israel without apology.'
The paused bombs shipment is part of an earlier aid package for Israel and not the fresh $95 million supplemental that Congress approved and Biden signed.