The Squad members are busy doing their bit for Hamas in the U.S. Congress, working to make sure Israeli civilians are exposed as much as possible to jihad rocket attacks.
“AOC, ‘Squad’ force House Dems to spike $1B for Israel’s Iron Dome from spending bill,” by Juliegrace Brufke and Samuel Chamberlain, New York Post, September 21, 2021:
A group of far-left lawmakers — including Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) — forced House Democratic leadership Tuesday to cut $1 billion for Israel’s Iron Dome from a short-term government funding bill.
The removal of the language from a continuing resolution that would keep the federal lights on through early December prompted an urgent call from Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid to House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.).
Lapid tweeted that Hoyer had reassured him that the cut was a “technical postponement” and that the aid “will be transferred soon.”
“I thanked Majority Leader Hoyer for his commitment and emphasized to him the need to approve the request as soon as possible to ensure Israel’s security needs,” tweeted Lapid, who added that his government was “rebuilding a relationship of trust with the Congress” after it had been “neglected” by former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
On Tuesday evening, Hoyer announced that he would bring a standalone bill on funding the Iron Dome program to the House floor before the end of this week, telling his colleagues: “I was for that. I’m still for it, we ought to do it.”
Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), the chair of the House Appropriations Committee, had told reporters earlier Tuesday that the Iron Dome funding would be added to the annual defense spending bill, but later opted to support it as a standalone measure.
“The United States must fully live up to our commitments to our friend and our ally, Israel,” DeLauro said.
“Squad” members had threatened to withhold their support for the bill if the provision wasn’t axed. With Democrats holding an eight-seat majority in the House, they can only afford to have three members of their conference vote against a measure before it is defeated.
Moderate House Democrats slammed their progressive colleagues for their anti-Israel stance, arguing that the Iron Dome is not an offensive weapon but rather a defense mechanism meant to shield civilians from rocket attacks by Islamist militant groups.
Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee who has worked at the Pentagon and the CIA, tweeted that removing the funding language from the legislation was “devoid of substance and irresponsible.”
“Iron Dome is a purely *defensive* system — it protects civilians when hundreds of rockets are shot at population centers,” she wrote. “Whatever your views on the Israeli-Pal[estinian] conflict, using a system that just saved hundreds, if not thousands, of lives as a political chit is problematic.”
Slotkin added that the $1 billion at issue “isn’t new funding, or unusual funding, or a precipitous increase in funding.
“All of this is publicly-available information,” she concluded. “So to target Iron Dome now means the issue isn’t a genuine concern over the system, but rather the desire to attack something – anything – related to the State of Israel; it’s devoid of substance and irresponsible.”
Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), a leading centrist, echoed Slotkin’s sentiments.
“The Iron Dome protects innocent civilians in Israel from terrorist attacks and some of my colleagues have now blocked funding it,” Gottheimer tweeted. “We must stand by our historic ally — the only democracy in the Middle East.”…
Charlie in NY says
This is all political theater. Speaker Pelosi inserted the Iron Dome funding in the legislation at the 11th hour to try to pry away Republican votes. When that gambit failed, the Squad figured it could score some political points with its base by demanding its excision. So now the GOP has shown its strict party discipline and the Squad has confirmed its blind anti-Zionism.
Bringing up Iron Dome funding as a stand alone will be a good opportunity for Congress to show the true extent of bi-partisan support for Israel. Equally significantly, the Squad’s views on Israel will be outed as entirely marginal.
All in all, Speaker Pelosi gave it the good old college try and now the Squad has positioned itself for a political defeat.
Infidel says
The Israelis should learn that Dems can’t be trusted: their mistake earlier this year was being one of the first to congratulate Biden. Until the GOP comes back to power, US is about as much an ally to Israel as Jordan is
CogitoErgoSum says
So maybe if Israel can’t depend upon a good defense it should concentrate more on its offensive capabilities. When I get tired of waving flies away from my face I get out the fly swatter and start killing flies. A dead fly doesn’t lay eggs somewhere in my house so that I have a bigger fly problem in the future either. If flies don’t want to end up dead they should learn to stay out of my house and not bother me …. but they seem unable to learn that so I don’t feel bad about killing pests that are so aggravating and so stupid.
Infidel says
The real solution lies in expelling the entire Pali population to Qatar or Yemen. Just round them up and send them to where Khaled Mashal is, or where the Houthis are. I’m sure Hamas should be able to get along well w/ the Houthis, despite one of them being shi’a and the other sunni, but if they can’t, I’m sure that President Raisi can resolve any disputes
commonsense says
I wish Israel had the balls to do this, infidel.
Walter Sieruk says
With this new Jihadwatch article about those Anti-Semitic Democrats in power in the USA ,it’s thus fitting to reiterate the wisdom found in the words of the former US President, William Howard Taft, who in a speech declared “Antisemitism is a noxious weed that should be cut out. It has no place in America.”
john smith says
These are truly evil people, and if anyone of them had their way, it would be bombs, and missiles, the US would be sending to Israel.
gravenimage says
Far-Left Dems, including AOC, Omar, and Tlaib, force House to cut $1,000,000,000 from Iron Dome funding for Israel
……………..
Just sickening. Iron Dome is a purely *defensive* program–these thugs are stumping for more Israelis to be murdered by Muslims.
OLD GUY says
I support Israel, but I am a little tired of our government spending trillions of our tax dollars on foreign aid and military assistance to other countries. I’d like to see the contracts for building the iron dome and what Corporations are getting these contracts and who in Washington is being politically funded by these companies.
gregbeetham says
AOC is just a nitwit, but the other two are disgusting, isn’t there a baseline for conduct in the house? How treasonous is one allowed to be before some kind of censure takes place?