Vice President Vance is denying a report that he had canceled a planned trip to Israel on Tuesday out of concern that he would appear to support Jerusalem’s widened Gaza operation. 

“I think it is a lot of overstatement there,” Mr. Vance told reporters Monday on his plane. He pointed to concerns about who would tend to his children if he and his wife were to remain extra days abroad following a trip to the Vatican over the weekend, but also “more serious things like how do we provide security, how do we make sure that we get all the assets that we need in order to do the right official delegation.”

Mr. Vance added, “I’m sure we’ll visit Israel. Sometime in the future, but not today.”

Earlier, Axios reported that while the vice president’s office cited “logistics” reasons for canceling the planned trip, an unidentified American official cited another reason. Mr. Vance “decided against it due to the expansion of Israel’s military operation in Gaza,” the official said. 

After a widespread operation at Rafah in southern Gaza over the weekend, Israeli troops entered Gaza’s second-largest city, Khan Yunis, destroying tunnels and killing major terrorist commanders. Israel also reversed a two-month policy of denying all humanitarian aid into the Strip, allowing in a few trucks carrying supplies.

“We cannot allow a famine situation in Gaza,” Prime Minister Netanyahu said. He added that some of Israel’s biggest supporters in Congress told him they can justify the assault on Hamas and everything else Israel is doing, “but we can’t stand by if there’s famine in Gaza.”

Publicly, the Trump administration expresses support for Israel, but it is working on a diplomatic solution. “We don’t want people obviously suffering as they have, and we blame Hamas for that but nonetheless, they’re suffering,” Secretary Rubio told CBS on Sunday. “We are actively engaged in trying to figure out how to get more hostages out through some cease-fire type mechanisms.”