The Senate voted down on Wednesday a long-shot effort by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and a handful of Democrats to block the sales of offensive weapons to Israel, amid a worsening humanitarian crisis in the northern Gaza Strip.
Sanders’s bid to halt the sale of tank rounds, mortar rounds, and missile guidance kits faced long odds in the Senate from the start, with opposition from the White House and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. The math is poised to worsen when a Republican majority takes office in January.
“People will laugh in your face.”
Not a single Republican voted for the trio of resolutions offered by Sanders. The most support one of the resolutions drew was 19 votes, less than half the Democratic caucus.
Speaking from the floor, Sanders said that senators who condemned human rights violations by repressive regimes without similarly condemning Israel would face mockery.
“People will laugh in your face,” Sanders said. “They will say you are concerned about China, you are concerned about Russia, you are concerned about Iran – well, why are you funding the starvation of children in Gaza right now?”
Floor Debate
In trying to block the shipments to Israel, Sanders employed a rarely used mechanism known as a joint resolution of disapproval, which allows Congress to halt specific arms sales to foreign countries.
Although Congress has voted on several measures related to the war in Gaza, the anti-war lobby group Friends Committee on National Legislation described the Sanders resolutions as “the first major vote in Congress to halt weapons sales to Israel.”
“A partnership should be a two-way street, not a one-way blank check.”
Sanders and the handful of allies who spoke Wednesday said they were strong supporters of Israel, but cast the resolutions as votes against an Israeli government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu whose unrelenting war has left northern Gaza at imminent risk of famine, all while derailing the Biden administration’s efforts to strike a ceasefire-for-hostages deal.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., said that U.S. law requires the recipients of American weapons to abide by international human rights laws and to not block humanitarian aid.
“The issue is not whether or not the United States is supporting Israel,” he said. “The issue is whether or not, as we provide that support, we have a two-way street. A partnership should be a two-way street, not a one-way blank check.”
The vote Wednesday shook out much like others related to the war: lopsided support for Israel across party lines.
Despite impassioned speeches from Sanders and others, most members of the Democratic caucus voted against blocking the arms sales. Ahead of the vote, the White House distributed talking points urging senators to vote down the resolutions, according to HuffPost.
The White House lobbying effort came as the U.S. vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution that would have demanded an immediate and unconditional ceasefire to the war in Gaza.
The first senator to speak against the resolutions was a Democrat, Sen. Jacky Rosen of Nevada, who said she knew that many of her colleagues felt torn. She suggested the weapons being sold to Israel would actually help save civilian lives, since they are “more precise and more accurate.” Schumer also took to the floor to oppose the resolutions.
Despite Democratic leaders’ unflinching support for Israel, Republicans have sought to cast themselves as the friendlier party to the Netanyahu regime. Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, said Sanders’s resolutions were the logical outcome of the administration’s brief pauses on shipping certain weapons to Israel.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., called for a “viable day-after plan” to provide for a “dignified life for the Palestinians,” while displaying with approval pictures of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
“What is the proper response to people who want to kill you and your family and destroy your way of life? I can tell you what the United States did,” Graham said. “We went to war, we dropped two atomic bombs to end a war we couldn’t afford to lose. What is the right response to those who want to kill all the Jews? Make sure they don’t have the capability to do it.”
Gaza Gets Worse
The Senate’s vote came as the situation on the ground in Gaza continued to worsen, according to aid groups.
“Famine is likely happening or imminent in north Gaza,” Cindy McCain, the executive director of the U.N. World Food Programme, said on X earlier this month. “Immediate steps MUST BE TAKEN to allow safe, rapid & unimpeded flow of humanitarian & commercial supplies to prevent an all-out catastrophe. NOW.”
“It’s been clear that the only way to really end this genocide is to stop the flow of U.S. weapons to Israel.”
Activists in the U.S. urged senators to vote for the Sanders resolutions this week. Nearly 50 were arrested in a Senate office building Tuesday as they rallied in favor of the measures.
“It’s been clear that the only way to really end this genocide is to stop the flow of U.S. weapons to Israel,” said Ramah Kudaimi, campaign director with the Action Center on Race and the Economy, who was a lead organizer of the protest on Tuesday.
“As long as the guns and bullets are being sent,” said Kudaimi. “Israel has what it needs to continue massacring Palestinian men, women and children, destroying mosques and churches and schools and homes and hospitals.”
Rebecca Roberts, an army veteran who left the military in protest over Gaza and was arrested at the Senate protest yesterday, said the vote shows us where elected officials stand in “black and white terms.”
“I think it’s going to be a very clear signal, beyond all signs we’ve gotten, that they’re not listening to their constituents,” said Roberts, correctly anticipating that the measures would fail. “They’re instead, going where the money goes, to get re-elected and to continue to get funding from AIPAC, and that their own political interests are of greater value to them than human life and our own well being.”
Progressive members of the House have echoed activists’ demands for the U.S. to stop arming Israel.
“I have sat with American Doctors who have desperately tried to save Palestinian children shot in the head. I have met with mothers who have watched their children die slowly, their bodies fatally burned in Israeli airstrikes. We are talking about a horrific crisis—a genocide,” said Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., in a statement to The Intercept. “Millions of Palestinians are facing violence, displacement, and starvation while the United States stands complicit in their suffering. It is long past time to change course and act with urgency to save lives.”
Halting the sale of weapons to Israel is the “obvious thing to do,” argued Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa.
“We see just the death toll, the immense destruction and the casualties in Gaza,” said Lee. “It feels so obvious to me that calling for peace, that calling for a halt to further destruction, which means the United States would have to stop arming Israel, is the obvious thing to do.”
