Senator Sanders: We cannot be complicit in current approach of Israeli government

[Donkees]

Dec 4, 2023

No, I do not think we should be appropriating $10.1 billion for the right-wing, extremist Netanyahu government to continue its current military approach. What the Netanyahu government is doing is immoral, it is in violation of international law, and the United States should not be complicit in those actions.

https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/prepared-remarks-sanders-expresses-concerns-about-foreign-aid-supplemental-bill/

[Donkees]

1. PREPARED REMARKS: Sanders Expresses Concerns About Foreign Aid Supplemental Bill

WASHINGTON, Dec. 4 – Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Monday evening spoke on the floor of the U.S. Senate about some of his concerns regarding the $106 billion emergency foreign aid supplemental bill that may soon be considered in the Senate.

Let me say a few words to express my concerns about the $106 billion emergency foreign aid supplemental bill that we may soon be considering. There are pieces of this bill I strongly support, but in its present form I do not think it serves the interests of the American people. Let me explain why.

First, while I strongly support Ukraine’s valiant efforts to defend itself against Putin’s invasion, and Israel’s need to defend itself against incoming rocket and missile attacks, I am deeply concerned that this legislation has no investments to address the needs of working families in the United States – 60 percent of whom are living paycheck to paycheck. Let’s be clear: it is not only foreign countries that face emergencies. We face enormous emergencies in this country right now in terms of child care, primary health care, housing, and much more. The American people do not want us to continue to ignore these issues.

Second, at a time when Congress will likely soon pass a $900 billion defense bill, this supplemental bill includes tens of billions that should be covered as part of the base defense budget and handled through normal appropriations, not allocated as “emergency” spending. We can save tens of billions of dollars in this bill and dedicate that money to some of the enormous domestic crises we face.


https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/prepared-remarks-sanders-expresses-concerns-about-foreign-aid-supplemental-bill/

[malaise]

3. He is correct

Rec

[Beastly Boy]

8. What did Sanders ever do to support opposition to Netanyahu in Israel?

[yardwork]

10. Probably the same thing he did for opposition to Trump.

[Beastly Boy]

12. You give Sanders too much credit.

He was rather active in opposing Hillary, Trump's only obstacle to gaining the presidency.

In the case of israel's political opposition to Netanyahu, he did nothing.

[riversedge]

2. "I am deeply concerned that this legislation has no investments to address the needs of working families in the United S

"I am deeply concerned that this legislation has no investments to address the needs of working families in the United States – 60 percent of whom are living paycheck to paycheck"

[Celerity]

4. K & R

[Aussie105]

5. Complicit? Starting to look like it!

Israel comes up with a swarm of justifications, but from a distance it looks Israeli is pursuing a scorched earth policy.

What is the Israeli plan once every building has been flattened, and every Palestinian person, Hamas or not, been either killed or driven out?

And does America want to be seen by the rest of the world as complicit in that process? Facilitating and supporting it?

[Lonestarblue]

6. We, and other Western nations, turned our backs on the Palestinians years ago.

For years, we have seen Israeli settlers killing Palestinians in the West Bank and taking their lands and we did nothing. The aid money and war equipment just kept flowing. I do not defend the heinous Hamas attack, but Israel left violence as the only option for Palestinians to defend their lands and try to prevent Israel from taking it all. Netanyahu’s public statement that Israel would annex the West Bank and open all of it to right-wing settlers may have been the impetus for Hamas to attack because with the Palestinians forced out of the West Bank any hope of a future state would be gone.

Some will say that Palestinians rejected statehood in the past. They were never offered statehood. They were offered negotiations to reach agreement with Israel, and Israel has always made demands that Palestinians could not accept. Netanyahu is on tape bragging that he deliberately blew up the Oslo Accords to prevent any Palestinian state and that he would never allow one. And this is the person that Israelis have chosen to lead them.

It’s long past time for the US and other nations to put conditions on our support of Israel and to help Palestinians build their own state. Hamas is a problem now, but killing hundreds of thousands of innocent civilian to kill a few thousand Hamas fighters is not acceptable. Israel has some of the best spyware and intelligence operations in the world. They know that the top leaders of Hamas are not even in Gaza. They could track the funding of Hamas and cut it off. They could identify how Hamas is getting weapons into Gaza and work with countries like Egypt to shut the smuggling down. Israel has other options than murdering many thousands of Palestinians and bombing their homes to leave nothing but rubble in Gaza. At the moment, though, it appears that they prefer killing as many Palestinians as possible.

[democrank]

7. K & R

[marble falls]

9. Once again, Bernie says it exactly right.

[librechik]

11. Thanks Bernie. You are a great man.

USA is caught in very dangerous triple or quadruple bind.

[David__77]

13. I'm thankful for his words.

I hope others agree or shortly come to agree. This is like minimum action to help salvage the US reputation.