“Outrageous”: Biden Slammed for Saying Israel Killed Aysenur Eygi by Accident

President Joe Biden sparked outrage on Tuesday after he claimed, without evidence, that Israel’s killing of American Aysenur Ezgi Eygi last week was accidental, despite the circumstances of Eygi’s death and Israel’s history of intentionally killing civilians.

In a statement, Biden acknowledged Israel’s responsibility for the killing and called for “full accountability,” though he did not specify whether the U.S. would take action to enforce that. He also didn’t say anything about the U.S. conducting its own investigation, instead stating that the U.S. has “confidence” in Israel’s investigations into its own wrongdoing.

He then added, in comments to the press: “Apparently, it was an accident. It ricocheted off the ground and — got hit by accident, but we’re working that out now.”

Vice President Kamala Harris also claimed in a statement, echoing Biden’s, that Eygi’s death was an accident, saying: “Israel’s preliminary investigation indicated it was the result of a tragic error for which the [Israeli military] is responsible.”

In reaction to Biden’s remark, Eygi’s partner, Hamid Ali, noted that the Biden administration has not reached out to Eygi’s loved ones about her death. Eygi’s family has called for an independent investigation into Eygi’s death, but the Biden administration appears poised to rely solely on Israel’s word, despite its long history of peddling outright lies.

“For four days, we have waited for President Biden to pick up the phone and do the right thing: To call us, offer his condolences, and let us know that he is ordering an independent investigation of the killing of Aysenur,” said Ali in a statement. “This was no accident and her killers must be held accountable.”

Eygi’s family put out a statement on Wednesday saying that Biden is going back on his word to protect Americans.

“President Biden has said, ‘If you harm an American, we will respond.’ On September 9th, the State Department claimed, ‘when it comes to the protection of our citizens and our personnel and if they are targeted, we of course will take appropriate action,’” her family said.

“President Biden is still calling her killing an accident based only on the Israeli military’s story. This is not only insensitive and false, it is complicity in the Israeli military’s agenda to take Palestinian land and whitewash the killing of an American,” they continued.

Testimony about Eygi’s death from witnesses make it clear that it would take an extremely unlikely set of coincidences for Israel to have killed her accidentally.

Israeli forces killed Eygi, a recent graduate of University of Washington, on Thursday shortly after a protest against illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank. Israeli soldiers had gone onto a roof about 200 meters from where Eygi was shot, said witnesses, including one of her fellow International Solidarity Movement volunteers, and soldiers shot her in the head as she was standing in an olive grove.

Even if the bullet had ricocheted and hit Eygi in the head, the Biden administration has not questioned why Israel would have been shooting at protesters to begin with — or whether Israel’s supposed investigation into her killing could produce reliable results.

The much more likely explanation, as Eygi’s family and supporters of Palestinian rights have said, is that Israeli soldiers killed the 26-year-old activist on purpose — like they have done to countless civilians, Palestinian and American, with U.S. weapons for decades.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Washington), head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said that Biden’s statement was “unacceptable.”

“This is an outrageous statement. We cannot simply accept IDF’s version that this was an ‘accident.’ We do not know that, it’s why we need independent investigation,” Jayapal said on Tuesday. “What accountability will there be when we keep supplying the weapons against our own laws?”