How are U.S. tax dollars being spent on Israel?
- Another strike on that tower.
Through a lot of military funding.
Since Israel's creation in 1948, the United States
has provided $236 billion in aid and missile defense funding.
Human rights groups say the Israeli army has been
using U.S.-made military equipment to attack Gaza.
In May 2021, Israeli air raids killed 200 people
in Gaza during the first week of violence.
Dozens were children.
It's why people are increasingly asking,
why does the U.S. continue to be complicit in Israel's violation of human rights?
Occupation no more!
Each year, the U.S. gives Israel $3.8 billion in military aid.
That's $38 billion total signed in a 10-year agreement between Israel and the U.S.
To put this military assistance in perspective,
annually it's a billion dollars more aid than the U.S. spent in the fight against the climate crisis.
When you do the numbers, it means the average individual U.S. taxpayer,
gives $26 in military assistance to Israel each year.
It's the cost of paying 47,000 elementary school teachers in the U.S.
This hefty U.S. military assistance ensures Israel's military
is one of the most technologically sophisticated in the world.
You're looking at the most advanced fighter jet ever made.
Israel used U.S. grants to purchase the lion's share of its F-35 Joint Strike Fighters.
And this is Iron Dome, Israel's missile defense system.
Israeli officials say around 90% of Hamas rockets
were intercepted by Iron Dome during a week of fighting in mid-May 2021.
Between 2011 and 2020, the U.S. invested $1.6 billion
into Iron Dome batteries, interceptors,
coproduction costs and general maintenance.
On top of the military funds the U.S. already provides, in May 2021 the Biden administration
approved an additional $735 million weapons sale to Israel.
This came as Israeli attacks on Gaza intensified.
Because my friends, day after day, year after year,
decade after decade, nonviolent Palestinian activists struggle against the daily violence
and harassment of occupation.
Violence and harassment subsidized, by the way,
with billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars.
U.S. military assistance to Israel also includes joint military exercises,
research and weapons development.
Now, Israel ranks as one of the top arms exporters in the world.
The state has exported missile defense systems, drones and cybersecurity products
to countries including India, Brazil, the U.S. and Russia.
But it's not just arms that the U.S. gives to Israel.
American governments have historically been staunch allies
of their Israeli counterparts on the international stage.
This includes blocking resolutions that challenge Israel's violations,
like building illegal settlements and blocking attempts to hold Israel accountable
for war crimes in Gaza.
There has not been a significant overreaction.
In the span of one week, Washington vetoed UN
Security Council calls for an immediate cease-fire between Israel and Hamas,
not once, not twice, but three times.
President Biden only added to calls for a cease-fire after eight days of violence.
In fact, the U.S. opposes the International Criminal Court's investigation into alleged war crimes
in the occupied territories.
Now, U.S. interests in the Middle East might be waning.
But Israel's security is still a cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy.
Here's what U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had to say:
As we've said before, Israel has the right to defend itself.
There is no equivalence between a terrorist group indiscriminately firing
rockets at civilians and a country defending its people from those attacks.
Publicly, the U.S. focused on civilian deaths from Hamas rockets.
There's no mention of Palestinians killed in Gaza or occupation.
This is part of a bigger problem.
For decades, the U.S. has said it supports a "peace process,"
but it's continued to block any efforts to stop Israel's systematic violations of international law.
This has been happening simultaneously as
Palestinians experience increasing dispossession and oppression.
This is why Palestinians don't see the U.S.
as an honest broker in the conflict.
In an effort to pressure Israel to follow international law,
Palestinians and their allies have been calling for the boycott, divestment
and sanctions of Israeli goods.
But in the U.S., this form of resistance has been targeted.
Many U.S. states are using anti-boycott laws and executive orders to
punish companies that refuse to do business with illegal Israeli settlements.
Palestinians rights to nonviolent resistance have been curtailed and even criminalized.
Our party leaders have spoken forcefully against BDS, calling its proponents anti-Semitic,
despite the same tactics being critical to ending the South African apartheid mere decades ago.
So what happens now?
Historically, there's been robust bipartisan support for Israel in Congress,
from military sales to the fact the U.S.
was first to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in 2017.
But now things might be changing.
Domestic support for Israel is facing more scrutiny.
And colleagues, Palestinians aren't going anywhere, no matter how much money
you send to Israel's apartheid government.
For the first time, the U.S.
has a Palestinian American woman in Congress, in Representative Rashida Tlaib.
And she has support.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and a group of progressive Democrats introduced
a resolution aimed at blocking the recent $735 million arms sale to Israel.
And the pressure against taxpayer funds toward Israel continues.