On Wednesday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) formally announced that he is preparing to introduce legislation that leverages U.S. law to block the Biden administration’s massive $20 billion weapons sale to Israel, citing Israel’s “illegal and indiscriminate” massacres of Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
Sanders is planning to file the resolutions next week, saying that the sale of the weapons, many of which are being used in Israel’s genocide in Gaza, “clearly violate[s]” domestic laws regarding human rights violations.
“Sadly, and illegally, much of the carnage in Gaza has been carried out with U.S.-provided military equipment,” said Sanders in a statement. “Providing more offensive weapons to continue this disastrous war would violate U.S. and international law.”
“We must end our complicity in Israel’s illegal and indiscriminate military campaign, which has caused mass civilian death and suffering,” he went on.
The sales, announced by the Biden administration in August, total over $20 billion in weapons to Israel — one of the largest single weapons deals with any foreign entity this year. It includes weapons like JDAMs, which are slated for “imminent delivery,” according to a Sanders fact sheet, and other arms like tank rounds, mortar rounds, military vehicles, fighter aircrafts and upgrades to Israel’s Boeing-made F-15s.
There is “extensive evidence” that these weapons have been used by Israeli forces to commit war crimes, as Sanders’s office points out. The Foreign Assistance Act and Arms Export Control Act both specify that weapons transfers must be consistent with international humanitarian law and not be sent to military units that commit human rights violations.
“Much of the carnage in Gaza has been carried out with U.S.-provided military equipment. Why on earth would the U.S. approve another $20 billion arms sale to Israel?” said Sanders. “Not another nickel for Netanyahu’s illegal war.”
Experts both in and out of the administration have said that Biden officials are knowingly violating U.S. and international law in order to continue sending weapons for Israel to use in its genocide of Palestinians.
The passage of the resolutions, then, would see the enforcement of “the many U.S. and international law standards that the Biden administration has violated by continuing arms transfers to Israel,” John Ramming Chappell, advocacy and legal advisor for the Center for Civilians in Conflict, told Truthout.
“Congress has not done nearly enough to stop the flow of weapons to Israel” amid countless likely war crimes, Chappell continued.
Sanders is planning on filing Joint Resolutions of Disapproval, which allow Congress to block weapons sales approved by the White House but have never actually successfully blocked an arms sale. When he files the resolutions, Sanders can force a vote on them; though they’re unlikely to pass, they will put a spotlight on senators’ approval of assistance to Israel at a time when the International Court of Justice has effectively ordered member states to end their weapons transfers to the apartheid state.
The announcement of the sale last month sparked outrage from pro-Palestine advocates, who said that the U.S. is fanning the flames of Israel’s genocide and risking wider war across the Middle East.
Even considered within the U.S.’s decades of being Israel’s primary military sponsor, the $20 billion sale is massive.
The sale is “massive by any measure, but they’re especially shocking in the context of Israel’s devastating campaign in Gaza,” said Chappell, pointing out that the $18.8 billion sale of F-15s and parts for the fighter jets are the latest single sale to Israel in at least the past decade.
“The Biden-Harris administration claims to be doing all they can to protect civilians, secure a ceasefire, get hostages released, and de-escalate regional tensions. But actions speak louder than words, and these sales show that the US government remains unwilling to use its most important source of leverage: the arms sales that make this war possible,” he said.
Sanders’s announcement came on the same day the UN General Assembly voted to pass a resolution demanding an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestine and calling for an arms embargo to Israel, as consistent with decisions by the International Court of Justice. The U.S. was one of only 14 member countries to vote against the resolution’s passage.
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