Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a US representative, said on Wednesday that she will oppose any future US military aid to Israel, including for defensive systems.
In a statement on social media, Ocasio-Cortez said that Israel was fully capable of funding “Iron Dome and other defensive systems”, and that “consistent with my voting record to date, I will not support Congress sending more taxpayer dollars and military aid to a government that consistently ignores international law and US law”.
Her remarks on Wednesday follow reports that she pledged to oppose any future military aid to Israel during a New York City Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) forum on Tuesday evening.
“Our allies who need our military aid must understand that we will provide it consistent with the Leahy amendment and the foreign assistance act”, Ocasio-Cortez added, referring to a law which prohibits the US from providing military support to army units that violate human rights.
According to City & State, which obtained a partial recording of the DSA forum, Ocasio-Cortez told members: “I have not once ever voted to authorize funding to Israel, and I will never,” adding that “the Israeli government should be able to finance their own weapons if they seek to arm themselves.”
How about any aid at all? That country needs a lot of things, democracy, ethics, morals, but it does not need aid for anything
I can see them spending money now to convince morons not to support her.
I’ll hold my breath.
Shoulda done that years ago. We wouldn’t be in this predicament today had that been done. She offered criticism of Israel, but when push came to shove she didn’t rock the boat when voting time came and she changed her vote away from “no” to fund Israel’s Iron Dome.
Hate on the politicians not moving, not on those moving too slow for your liking. This shit is why you have Trumpaloompa now.
Based
Fuck yeah, hopefully AOC starts a fuck aid to Israel trend
Only after Ana Kasparian called Lyin’ Zion AOC out on her lies on twitter. And love how she is bringing up the Leahy amendment now when she was fucking ride or die for Biden and Kamala despite the fact that they violated the Leahy amendment AND other US laws AND international law🙄 She’s a neolib Zio grifter whose sole purpose is to put a cap on leftward movement in the Democratic Party and their base🤮
I of course wish AOC would go further and she’s not perfect, but I won’t let perfect be the enemy of the good in this situation.
It’s good that she’s saying this.
If she backs it up with actions maybe. But words are empty and it’s too little too late. Her actions up until now have supported the occupying Zionist entity and its genocide. It’s hard for me and a lot of anti-Zionists to take her seriously when it is very obviously politically expedient for her to say this at this moment (especially right after Ana Kasparov called her out on twitter for her support of Israel). She’s still an opportunist that is part of an imperialist, Zionist party that is complicit in the murder of countless civilians across the globe, and, worst of all, doesn’t seem to understand that. You say “perfect is the enemy of the good” but what good is this for Gaza now when it is decimated and hundreds of thousands have been slaughtered, many still buried under the rubble?
“I have not once ever voted to authorize funding to Israel, and I will never,”
She has though: https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2024128, https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2023681, https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/202428
It’s a much better track record than pretty much anyone else but this article and post is a pretty blatant attempt at reputation laundering.
Do y’all really fall for this so easily?
And she even called MTG antisemitic for it
Which one of these you linked is providing funding to Israel?
In order:
H.R.5917
This bill extends the authority of the President to impose sanctions on foreign persons using human shields through 2030 and requires the President to impose such sanctions on each foreign person determined to be a member of Palestine Islamic Jihad and orders, controls, or otherwise directs the use of human shields. Currently, such sanctions are (1) required for users of human shields who are members of Hamas or Hezbollah or supporters of those groups, and (2) authorized for other users of human shields.
The President must also determine if a person named in certain congressional requests meets the criteria for such sanctions and report on whether the President intends to impose sanctions on that person.
Additionally, the Department of Defense must report to Congress on the implications of the use of human shields by Hamas, Hezbollah, and Palestine Islamic Jihad.
H.R.5961
This bill requires the President to impose property-blocking sanctions on foreign financial institutions and international financial institutions that process, participate in, or facilitate a transaction involving certain Iranian funds (namely, the approximately $6 billion of Iranian funds that the Biden administration permitted to be transferred from restricted accounts in South Korea to restricted accounts in Qatar to facilitate the release of five U.S. citizens detained in Iran).
H.R.6679
This bill imposes immigration-related penalties on certain non-U.S. nationals (aliens under federal law) who are involved with terrorism or attacks against Israel.
Under this bill, members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad or Hamas or who participated in or otherwise facilitated the October 7, 2023, attacks on Israel may not be admitted into the United States.
The bill also expands an existing admissions bar against officers, representatives, and spokespersons of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). Under this bill, all PLO members are barred from admission into the United States.
The bill also prohibits any non-U.S. national who participated in or otherwise facilitated the October 7, 2023, attacks from seeking any immigration-related relief or protections, including (1) protection from being deported to a country where the individual’s life or freedom would be threatened, or (2) asylum in the United States.
Summaries are generally misleading.
Full text for H.R.5917: https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-bill/5917/text where it outlines the modifications to public law 115-348 which according to Sec. 3.d authorizes usage of the IEEPA to enforce sanctions.
Israel then directly receives defense spending to enforce those sanctions as well as indirectly being funded via any seized assets that are found in violation of those sanctions as “reperations”. Here’s an example of a $500Mil funding source.
H.R.5961 uses essentially the same mechanism but targets Iran specifically redirecting a large chunk of the $6B mentioned towards Israel.
You are correct that H.R.6679 isn’t about funding, but I still felt it was important to include.
Thank you!
H.R.4016, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act
Sec. 8067. Of the amounts appropriated in this Act under the headings “Procurement, Defense-Wide” and “Research, Development, Test and Evaluation, Defense-Wide”, $500,000,000 shall be for the Israeli Cooperative Programs: Provided, That of this amount, $60,000,000 shall be for the Secretary of Defense to provide to the Government of Israel for the procurement of the Iron Dome defense system to counter short-range rocket threats, subject to the U.S.-Israel Iron Dome Procurement Agreement; $127,000,000 shall be for the Short Range Ballistic Missile Defense (SRBMD) program, including cruise missile defense research and development under the SRBMD program; $40,000,000 shall be for co-production activities of SRBMD systems in the United States and in Israel to meet Israel’s defense requirements consistent with each nation’s laws, regulations, and procedures, subject to the U.S.-Israeli co-production agreement for SRBMD; $100,000,000 shall be for an upper-tier component to the Israeli Missile Defense Architecture, of which $100,000,000 shall be for co-production activities of Arrow 3 Upper Tier systems in the United States and in Israel to meet Israel’s defense requirements consistent with each nation’s laws, regulations, and procedures, subject to the U.S.-Israeli co-production agreement for Arrow 3 Upper Tier; and $173,000,000 shall be for the Arrow System Improvement Program including development of a long range, ground and airborne, detection suite.
This is what AOC voted on in regard to Israel and the Iron Dome.
MTG had offered an amendment that would cut the funding for Israeli defense and AOC voted against it, allowing the funds to remain in the bill.
Thank you!
She was going to vote against it originally. Then supposedly Pelosi convinced her to change her vote. So she voted present.
It’s a difficult spot to be in, given that much of her support relies on the zionists in New York like Schumer, etc in her party… Donors too…
Im in her district. She doenst need that support. She is perfectly safe here.
Yeah it must be SOOO difficult to sacrifice tens of thousands of innocent civilians so that she can stay in power and not make her colleagues uncomfortable. Give me a break. She’s an evil Zio neolib like the rest of the Democratic Party. Crocodile tears
She’s an evil Zio neolib like the rest of the Democratic Party. Crocodile tears
That’s literally MAGA speak with different slurs, lol
Call it what you want but it’s still the truth
Oh, okay lol
Support and protect this person and leaders like them. Fight for them.
I want to VOTE for her! Oh wait, I already do! Now want to vote for her for Senate (don’t let the door clobber you in the ass on the way out Schmuckie-boy!), and then President!
I mean… I would vote for her (to be POTUS) too, since I’m very much a democratic socialist. Unfortunately her chances of actually being the Democrat nominee are basically zero. And even if she did get that far, she would lose in the same way Kamala and Hillary did. Fence sitters and centrists seem incapable of voting for a woman. 🤷♂️
I would be elated to be proven wrong! Please, Universe! Prove me wrong on this!
Fence sitters and centrists seem incapable of voting for a woman.
It’s really disingenuous to boil it all down to a gender war. Neither Clinton nor Harris ran good campaigns.
Both were also victims of various forms of election manipulation and fraud, although Hillary’s campaign was especially godawful.
AOC suddenly jumping out a window in 1,2,3…
Better late than never, but the left coalition of the party could have done this 75,000 Palestinians ago.
accurate estimate range about 300000 Palestinians. or about 1/6th
If their plan is to block future US military aid to israel why are they running for a party that vowed to give israel whatever it needs?
AOC tends to submit to party politics, but it’s important to understand that you don’t need to do that to run under a party’s name. Parties in America don’t get to control their membership and there’s on paper at least no mechanism to enforce intraparty compliance. It’s more accurate to say that she runs as a Democrat than that she runs for Democrats.
AOC is a member of the democrats, she’s not independent, she runs for democrats.
Because there is a deep divide in the party. The voters are turning on Israel in massive numbers. The leadership has not changed position.
The solution is new leadership, like AOC, that reflects the will of the voters. That’s how democracy is supposed to work, in theory.
The alternative is doubling down for Israel and further fracturing the Democratic base. I’m not voting for Gavin Newsom or Kamala Harris or any other pro-genocide candidate in 2028, “lesser of two evils” be damned.
Because the reality right now is our system is fundamentally broken, and running as an independent is political suicide due to how the platform works and how people who don’t pay attention to politics tend to vote.
I’m definitely an idealist, but over the last few years have to admit that reality doesn’t match what if love to see and we have to let individuals in positions to push change work from within the system sometimes.
If a “good” guy running for republicans were to show up everyone would still give him shit for being a member of the red party, the same should apply for the democrats party.
Political suicide doesn’t mean shit, you are not going to die running as an independent at worst you are not getting featured in mainstream medias because these are centralized and rigged and only talk and give exposure to certain politicians.
Aoc keep using twitter and doesn’t have a mastodon account, to me it looks like this person doesn’t have any intention to change the system and it’s actually benefiting from it.
If lemmy devs had used the “political suicide” logic they would be working at reddit trying to make it less evil and you wouldn’t be here.
Sombody guard her because Mosad already is planing to eliminate her.
Yeah I was about to say damn what a shame she was so young.
Israel should be disarmed.
It would force them to negotiate diplomaticly and lead to much more peace in the middle east
Hey, it looks like you’re trying to write Destroyed.
One genocide (or several) doesn’t make another one right…
“Nazi germany should be destroyed”
wow um so you just hate germans?
The removal of a state is not genocide.
Or are you the sort of racist who would support Rhodesia existing over Zimbabwe?
State ≠ people
