Issue with cross compile and --64

[Matthew Stock]

Hi folks,

Looking for some guidance from folks on how to resolve a problem I'm
running into.  Short version is that I have a custom 32-bit CPU core
with a target for binutils, gcc and newlib target (hobby stuff).  I
haven't updated the toolchain in about 9 months or so, and this time
around it failed when building gcc, complaining that my cross-gas
didn't recognize --64:

make[2]: Entering directory '/home/mstock/projects/gnutools/build/gcc/gcc'
g++ -c   -g -O2     -DIN_GCC  -DCROSS_DIRECTORY_STRUCTURE
-fno-exceptions -fno-rtti -fasynchronous-unwind-tables -W -Wall
-Wno-narrowing -Wwrite-strings -Wcast-qual -Wmissing-format-attribute
-Wconditionally-supported -Woverloaded-virtual -pedantic
-Wno-long-long -Wno-variadic-macros -Wno-overlength-strings
-fno-common  -DHAVE_CONFIG_H  -DGENERATOR_FILE -I. -Ibuild
-I../../../gcc/gcc -I../../../gcc/gcc/build
-I../../../gcc/gcc/../include  -I../../../gcc/gcc/../libcpp/include  \
    -o build/genmodes.o ../../../gcc/gcc/genmodes.cc
/home/mstock/cross/bexkat1-elf/bin/as: unrecognized option '--64'

Host and build are Linux, target is bexkat1-elf (custom).

For this group, my question: is this an issue with my gas port, or
should I be looking at gcc?  The intersection of issues here are
unique enough where google hasn't really helped.  Thanks for any
suggestions.

Matt