Senate rejects Bernie Sanders bid to block US arms sales to Israel in historic vote

Despite the failure of the resolutions, vote marks a major first in effort to place conditions on aid to ally Israel

Senator Bernie Sanders leaves a media conference on restricting arms sales to Israel, on November 19. Getty Images / AFP

The Senate on Wednesday rejected resolutions that would have blocked the sale of offensive weapons to Israel, in a historic – albeit doomed – vote that for the first time saw significant efforts in pro-Israel Washington to crack down on unchecked support to the US ally.

Three joint resolutions of disapprovals on military support to Israel were put up to a vote and all were certain to be blocked.

The resolutions, led by progressive Senator Bernie Sanders, hinged on the argument that President Joe Biden's administration has breached the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 and the Arms Export Control Act with its continued support of Israel, which has been accused of blocking humanitarian aid from reaching Gaza. Sending military assistance to foreign nations blocking humanitarian assistance is against US law.

The vote on the resolutions marked one of the highest-level displays of the rare splintering on Capitol Hill over support for Israel, including notable support from nearly half of Senate Democrats.

The military offensive in Gaza, which has killed more than 43,900 people, has cracked a bipartisan wall of unity in support of Israel which has been most deeply felt in the Democratic Party.

Mr Sanders directed his Wednesday evening remarks towards members of Congress who have been outspoken about human rights abuses occurring in other parts of the world.

“You cannot condemn human rights around the world and then turn a blind eye to what the United States government is now funding in Israel – people will laugh in your face,” he said on the Senate floor ahead of the landmark vote.

“If we do not demand that the countries we provide military assistance to obey international law, we will lose our credibility on the world stage.”

The resolutions were not a blanket block on weapons, but took aim at specific sales, including 120mm tank rounds worth about $774.1 million, 120mm high explosive mortar rounds worth about $61.1 million, and joint direct attack munitions worth $262 million.

Israel's ambassador to Washington, Michael Herzog, spoke out against the resolutions before the Senate vote, saying in a statement on X that “anyone urging you to ban critical arms to Israel during an existential war is not pro-Israel”.

The majority of Senate Democrats, clinging to their final weeks of control in the upper chamber, voted against the measure. Many in the Senate have mirrored the Biden administration's use of verbal warnings about Israel's conduct in Gaza without taking action.

Chief among them is Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish-American elected official in US history, who made waves this year when he called on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to step aside over the war in Gaza.

Mr Schumer, however, lobbied hard to get his fellow Democrats to reject the resolutions.

“Voting to block assistance today could well very embolden Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran and endanger Israel security on into the future,” he said on the Senate floor.

“I know there are many in this chamber who have been strongly critical of Prime Minister Netanyahu's policies. I am certainly one of them … However, our security assistance to Israel transcends any one prime minister or any one government.”

This position echoes what US media reported on Wednesday said that the White House had been telling Democratic senators, including a memo “suggesting lawmakers who vote against the arms are empowering American and Israeli foes from Iran to the militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah”, the Huffington Post reported.

White House Jewish liaison Shelley Greenspan elevated a tweet that stated the Biden administration is “not the lame duck the left was hoping for” on Israel and Gaza.

Ben Cardin, chairman of the Senate foreign relations committee, was among the Democrats who forcefully opposed the effort on the Senate floor, asking: “Why isn't the focus on Hamas?”

He pointed out that the munitions affected by these resolutions would not directly impact the current conflict in Gaza, highlighting that some of the munitions “have a delivery date three years from now”.

“These are replenishments. This is so Israel has the capacity to defend itself against future threats that we know are in the region, that are real. It's not engaged in the current conflict in Gaza,” he said. “I am somewhat confused – I don't understand these resolutions as furthering the cause [Mr Sanders] has indicated.”

The progressive US senators who co-sponsored the resolutions said they are making a simple request of the Congress: follow US law.

“The truth of the matter is that, from a legal perspective, these resolutions are not complicated. They're cut and dry,” Mr Sanders told reporters this week. “The United States government is currently in violation of the law, and every member of the US Senate who believes in the rule of law should vote for these resolutions.”

Senator Peter Welch, who co-sponsored the bill, added: “Is the US forced to be blind to the suffering before our very eyes particularly when it’s our ammunitions being used? … Our view is no.”

The failed legislation managed to pick up significant momentum in recent days from prominent Democrats, attracting progressive Senator Elizabeth Warren and Senator Tim Kaine, who was Hillary Clinton's running mate in 2016.

Mr Kaine announced his vote in a statement early on Wednesday morning, emphasising that “the United States must prioritise the transfer of defensive weapons – such as those used to defeat drone and missile attacks – to Israel instead of offensive weapons that cause severe civilian harm in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon”.

Prominent Jewish groups aligned with the Democratic Party endorsed the resolutions as well.

Americans for Peace Now, a progressive Jewish-American group, told The National that it was “strongly supporting” the resolutions and had “been urging senators to vote in favour”.

Hadar Susskind, the organisation's president and chief executive, said that despite the resolutions' ultimate failure, it is a significant step for Washington:

“I don't look at these votes as some kind of defeat, because its quite remarkable that there's going to be a vote on the floor in which a large number of senators are going to vote to condition aid to Israel,” Mr Susskind told The National. “This is something that has never happened before … and it was inconceivable a year or two years ago.”

The vote also comes after the Biden administration failed to act on a 30-day deadline it had set for Israel to improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza. Officials claimed Israel had made “number of steps to address the measures laid out”.

“To be pretty blunt, I think the Biden administration has failed to follow the law and failed to follow its own policies,” Senator Chris Van Hollen, another co-sponsor of the resolutions, told reporters.

“You would think after a letter like this was sent, things would at least get a little better. They've gotten a lot worse. So what's the point in setting a letter if you don't mean what you say?”

The US is preparing for major changes after national elections that delivered Republicans complete control in Washington, and there is no rift over Israel in the Republican leadership, as there is among Democrats.

Hawkish Republican Senator Lindsey Graham spoke in opposition to the resolutions, arguing that the regional chaos is “not about Bibi, folks – it's about a strain of Islam that will kill every Jew, including Bibi, and come after us, unless they're defeated”.

Mr Graham added that Washington has “a historic opportunity here to give Israel what they need to finish the war they can't afford to lose, come up with a day-after plan that would replace Hamas with a better life, try to get Lebanon in a better space and build on the Abraham Accords”.

“This effort by my colleagues undercuts all that,” he said.

Before Wednesday's vote, incoming Senate majority leader John Thune criticised the resolutions and said the new Republican majority in Congress will increase Washington's support to Israel in the new year.

“For the past year plus, Democrats have struggled to support our ally Israel and it has literally fractured the Democratic Party … the refusal to have our ally's back and the hesitation to call out anti-Semitism in our own country has consequences,” he said at a press conference.

Mr Thune also pledged that his party will move to sanction the International Criminal Court over its efforts to arrest Israeli officials.