US eyes accelerated funding for Israel as it warns against Iran retaliation

The United States is reviving efforts to push through a stalled funding package for Israel despite saying it will not help with any counteroffensive measures against Iran.

President Joe Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a phone call late on Sunday that the US would not take part in any retaliatory action in response to Iran's air attack the previous day.

Despite the US president joining global calls for restraint, the rising tensions in the Middle East look set to accelerate approval of a stalled funding package that would see Washington hand Netanyahu $14 billion in aid, reports Al Jazeera.

"We believe Israel has freedom of action to protect itself and defend itself. That's a longstanding policy and that remains, but no, we would not envision ourselves participating in such a thing," a senior US administration official said on Sunday.

The Iranian attack, which came in response to a strike – as yet unclaimed by Israel – on Iran's embassy in Syria on 1 April, saw more than 300 missiles and drones launched towards Israel. However, it caused only modest damage, with most shot down by Israel, with help from the US, the United Kingdom, France and Jordan.

Israel's five-member war cabinet, which met on Sunday evening, is reported to favour retaliation. However, division over the timing and scale of any response is said to persist.

In a statement issued late on Saturday, Biden said he had told Netanyahu that Israel had "demonstrated a remarkable capacity to defend against and defeat even unprecedented attacks". However, he did not reveal if Israel's response was discussed.

John Kirby, the White House's top national security spokesperson, sought to set out the US position clearly in an interview on the NBC channel on Sunday.

"Our commitment is ironclad" to defending Israel and to "helping Israel defend itself", he said, before adding: "As the president has said many times, we don't seek a wider war in the region. We don't seek a war with Iran."