Democrats Find Themselves Split On Military Aid to Israel
Jose Nino
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Senate Democrats have recently found themselves mired in an intraparty debate on whether to tack strings to military aid for Israel in an effort to limit additional civilian casualties in Gaza.
This comes as a vote on a foreign aid package that features aid for Ukraine and Taiwan is quickly approaching.
This debate within Democrat ranks comes as the Biden regime is pushing Israel to change its plans for the next stage of its campaign in Gaza to minimize civilian casualties.
The Democrats’ discussions picked up steam in the middle of November, when Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders urged Congress to impose conditions on any supplemental spending bill for Israel. He did so to cease what he described as Israel’s “indiscriminate bombing” of Gaza. Other Democrats and the overwhelming Republicans have argued that the US shouldn’t try hamstringing military aid to Israel as it tries to liquidate Hamas after its October 7.
New York Senator Chuck Schumer said on November 28, 2023 that elected officials held a meeting with White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan on the issue of minimizing civilian casualties.
“That’s the number one North Star,” Schumer stated.
“We ask that Israel and any military action be sensitive to the collateral damage of innocent individuals,” declared Illinois Senator Dick Durbin on MSNBC on November 29. “But we have not reached any agreement as to any conditionality,” he said.
Thanks to the Democrats’ changing voter base, which is increasingly non-white and pro-Palestinian, they’re facing greater pressure to stand up to Israel’s punitive military campaign in Gaza. According to the authorities in Gaza, over 15,000 Palestinians in Gaza have perished since Israel responded to Hamas’ October 7 attack
In a social media post on the night of November 28 from his presidential campaign account, Biden declared: “Hamas unleashed a terrorist attack because they fear nothing more than Israelis and Palestinians living side by side in peace. To continue down the path of terror, violence, killing, and war is to give Hamas what they seek.”
Other Democrats, which included Oregon Senator Ron Wyden, Maryland Senator Ben Cardin, and Delaware Senator Chris Coons, declared that they opposed the concept of conditioning additional aid to Israel.
“You don’t condition the aid on an ally,” Cardin declared. “We’re not going to try to micromanage their defense.” However, Coons said he expects the Israel military aid question to be “vigorously debated” by Congress. “This is a difficult issue that will require further conversation,” he commented.
Watching Democrats tackle the Israel question as the Jewish goes harder to the Right will be fascinating to watch. As mentioned before, the modern-day Democrat Party has very little semblance to the Democrat Party of the 20th century which was whiter and more pro-Zionist.
It will be interesting to watch how US-Israel relations will unfolds as the US grows more non-white and younger people begin to wake up to the perfidious nature of the Jewish state.
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