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House Progressives Say US 'Must Suspend Offensive Weapons' to Israel
"Failure to do so not only risks our leverage in ceasefire negotiations, it undermines our country's own national security and weakens America's commitment to human rights as a cornerstone of our foreign policy."
Dec 17, 2024
Twenty progressives in the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday wrote to top Biden administration officials arguing that "the United States government must suspend offensive weapons" to Israel over its destruction of the Gaza Strip, citing federal and international law.
Led by Reps. Summer Lee (D-Pa.) and Greg Casar (D-Texas), the incoming Congressional Progressive Caucus chair, the lawmakers began by thanking U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin for their October 13 letter threatening to cut off weapons to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government if it did not dramatically improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza.
"However, despite your administration acknowledging that the Netanyahu government did not fully address the United States' concerns over Gaza and has failed to meet all of the conditions stipulated in this letter, the State Department decided not to take further action, including the suspension of offensive military assistance, to ensure full compliance," the Democrats wrote.
"We believe continuing to transfer offensive weapons to the Israeli government prolongs the suffering of the Palestinian people and risks our own national security by sending a message to the world that the U.S. will apply its laws, policies, and international law selectively," they continued. "Furthermore, a failure to act will put Israeli lives in danger by prolonging Netanyahu's war, isolating Israel on the international stage, and creating further instability in the region."
The new letter comes just over a month away from President Joe Biden leaving office and follows one from last week signed by 77 House Democrats—including Casar—that demanded "a full assessment of the status of Israel's compliance with all relevant U.S. policies and laws, including National Security Memorandum 20 (NSM-20) and Section 620I of the Foreign Assistance Act."
This one goes further, explicitly urging the Biden administration to suspend offensive military transfers and warning that "failure to do so not only risks our leverage in cease-fire negotiations, it undermines our country's own national security and weakens America's commitment to human rights as a cornerstone of our foreign policy."
"We remain committed to saving Palestinian and Israeli lives. This means doing everything possible to prioritize the release of hostages, secure a lasting cease-fire deal, and move toward long-term peace," the 20 progressives concluded.
In addition to Lee and Casar, Tuesday's letter was signed by Democratic Reps. Jamaal Bowman (N.Y.), Cori Bush (Mo.), Joaquin Castro (Texas), Lloyd Doggett (Texas), Veronica Escobar (Texas), Jesús "Chuy" García (Ill.), Al Green (Texas), Sara Jacobs (Calif.), Pramila Jayapal (Wash.), Hank Johnson (Ga.), Jim McGovern (Mass.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (Minn.), Mark Pocan (Wis.), Ayanna Pressley (Mass.), Delia C. Ramirez (Ill.), Rashida Tlaib (Mich.), and Bonnie Watson Coleman (N.J.).
It came on the same day as a lawsuit filed by Palestinians and Palestinian Americans accusing the U.S. State Department of creating "unique, insurmountable processes to evade the Leahy Law requirement to sanction abusive Israeli units."
As of Tuesday, the 14-month Israeli assault on Gaza in retaliation for the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack has killed at least 45,059 people and wounded another 107,041, according to local officials. Israel's slaughter and starvation of Palestinian civilians have led to a genocide case at the International Court of Justice as well as International Criminal Court arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant.
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Congress Accused of 'Moral Cowardice' for Enabling Endless War in Iraq and Syria
The House of Representatives rejected a measure that would have forced them to debate and vote on military intervention
Jun 18, 2015
The U.S. House Representatives is being accused of cowardice after voting down a bill on Wednesday that would have forced them to take responsibility for the ten-month-old war in Syria and Iraq by mandating a vote for or against its authorization.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted Wednesday to shut down debate on the war against ISIS by rejecting a bipartisan resolution that would have forced Congress to make a decision about whether or not to authorize the ten-month-old military intervention.
"It's a sad statement that it took this type of effort to force Congress to debate a war that is nearly a year old." --Stephen Miles, Win Without War
Reps. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), Walter Jones (R-N.C.), and Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) earlier this month invoked a procedure under the 1973 War Powers Resolution to introduce the legislation, which would have forced the U.S. to withdraw most troops from Iraq and Syria by the end of this year at the latest. If passed, the measure would have pushed Congress to make an explicit decision within the next six months about whether to wage the war.
Apparently, this is not a decision that Congress is interested in making.
The proposal was defeated 139-288, with almost all Republicans and 66 Democrats voting against the bill.
In comments made before Wednesday's vote on the House floor, McGovern charged that Congress is "guilty of moral cowardice."
"For over 10 months, the United States has been engaged in hostilities in Iraq and Syria without debating an authorization for this war," he said. "This House appears to have no problem sending our uniformed men and women into harm's way; it appears to have no problem spending billions of dollars for the arms, equipment and airpower to carry out these wars; but it just can't bring itself to step up to the plate and take responsibility for these wars."
The U.S. coalition has dropped more than 15,000 bombs and missiles on Iraq and Syria since August 2014, according to the calculations of journalist Chris Woods. Numerous civilians have been directly killed by these bombardments and analysts warn that the intervention only worsens bloodshed and displacement throughout the region.
Wednesday's two-hour floor discussion is the closest that Congress has come to a real debate on the war since it began August 8, 2014.
"It's a sad statement that it took this type of effort to force Congress to debate a war that is nearly a year old," Stephen Miles of Win Without War told Common Dreams. "It is cowardly of Congress to not have a debate out of political concerns."
Now that the McGovern bill has been defeated, all of the proposals left on the table reinforce the status quo of endless war. Both the authorization for use of military force (AUMF) against ISIS proposals currently on the table--one from President Barack Obama, the other from bipartisan senators--greenlight open-ended and geographically limitless war.
Meanwhile, the war continues to expand, despite no congressional vote and the recent admission from the president that his administration has "no complete strategy" regarding Iraq.
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