Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vermont) on Tuesday called on Congress to withhold more than $10 billion in military funding to Israel, saying it would be a “grossly disproportionate” and “immoral” move by the Israeli government in Gaza. He warned that the money would be used to fund the war.
This was the latest criticism leveled by Liberal senators at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's response to the October 7 killing of more than 1,200 Israeli civilians by Palestinian militants.
“While we recognize that Hamas's barbaric attack started this war, we find Israel's military response grossly disproportionate, immoral, and in violation of international law,” Sanders said in a statement Tuesday. We must also recognize that
Sanders said Americans “need to understand that Israel's war against the Palestinian people has been waged to a large extent with American bombs, artillery shells, and other weapons.”
“And the consequences were devastating,” he continued, pointing to a report by the Palestinian Ministry of Health that said Israeli attacks killed more than 22,000 Palestinians, two-thirds of them women and children. .
Sanders noted that an estimated 57,000 Palestinian civilians were injured and 85 percent of Gaza's population had been forced to flee their homes.
Sanders repeatedly called on Congress to reject more than 10 billion in proposed military aid to Israel as part of an emergency foreign aid package that includes funding for Ukraine, the Indo-Pacific region and border security.
He claimed the funds amounted to “unconditional military aid to the right-wing Netanyahu regime, which continues its brutal war against the Palestinian people.”
“Fuck off. Congress must deny that funding.”
Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, last month voted against a procedural motion that would have pushed an $110 billion emergency foreign aid plan that included funding for Israel. All other members of the Democratic caucus voted in favor of continuing the bill.
The Vermont senator's statement follows a similar rebuke on Dec. 4, when he called on Congress not to give Israel $10 billion to fund the invasion of Gaza.
“I do not believe that the right-wing extremist Netanyahu government should appropriate $10.1 billion to continue its current military approach,” he said on the Senate floor last month. “What the Netanyahu government is doing is immoral and violates international law, and the United States should not be complicit in these actions.”
In a Dec. 12 letter to President Biden, Sanders wrote that Israel's military response in the Gaza Strip has amounted to “an act of mass atrocity,” and that it has targeted Israeli civilians beyond its defense systems. Providing an additional $10.1 billion in military aid is irresponsible.” Attacks by missiles and rockets.
“Israel's military campaign will be remembered as one of the darkest chapters in modern history,” he warned, noting that as of mid-December more than 130 UN personnel had been killed in the conflict.
As of that date, the United States had delivered more than 15,000 bombs and more than 57,000 155-millimeter shells to Israel since Oct. 7, and the Israeli military had received more than 22,000 rounds delivered by the United States, Sanders said. He cited media reports that the US had dropped bombs on Gaza.
He said the destruction in Gaza exceeded the “nightmare threshold” of destruction caused by the US bombing of Dresden, German and Japanese cities during World War II.
Copyright 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
