December
11, 2023
"Our
district didn't send President Biden to the White House to have him facilitate
the killing of innocent civilians," said the Michigan Democrat.
U.S.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib said Monday that the Biden administration has put itself
"at serious risk of prosecution by the International Criminal Court"
by continuing to provide the Israeli military with weapons as it carries out
grave war crimes in the Gaza Strip.
In
a statement, Tlaib (D-Mich.) slammed the administration's decision late last
week to bypass Congress and approve the sale of $100 million of tank ammunition
to the Israeli military. The U.S. State Department notified lawmakers of its
decision an hour before midnight on Friday, circumventing congressional review
of the deal.
"Just
hours after the U.S. vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for an
immediate cease-fire and the release of hostages, the Biden administration
notified us that they bypassed Congress to send [Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin] Netanyahu $100 million of tank ammunition to continue to carry out
war crimes and massacre innocent Palestinians," said Tlaib, the first
Palestinian American woman ever elected to Congress.
"Our
district didn't send President [Joe] Biden to the White House to have him
facilitate the killing of innocent civilians," she added. "We didn't
turn out in huge numbers to elect President Biden to have him supply the bombs
for a genocide. This administration's refusal to acknowledge the human dignity
of Palestinians is disturbing, and actions like this speak loud and
clear."
The
New York Timesreported Saturday that the State Department "invoked an
emergency provision in the Arms Export Control Act" to justify the move.
Since the Hamas-led attack on October 7, the Biden administration has kept its
arms transfers to Israel shrouded in secrecy and has tried to accelerate the
flow of weapons by working around Congress.
Over
the past two months, the U.S. has provided Israel with roughly 15,000
bombs—including 2,000-pound bunker busters—and nearly 60,000 artillery shells,
without attaching any conditions.
An
Amnesty International investigation published last week found that Israel used
U.S.-made Joint Direct Attack Munitions to carry out airstrikes that killed
more than 40 people from two families. Amnesty said the attacks "must be
investigated as war crimes."
Legal
experts and scholars have been warning since October that U.S. officials could
be rendering themselves complicit in war crimes—and genocide—by continuing to
arm the Israeli military as it wages indiscriminate war on the Gaza Strip.
Tlaib
echoed that warning Monday, noting that the Biden administration has opted to
"give weapons to a military that is very publicly and actively committing
serious war crimes and crimes against humanity."
"President
Biden has seen refugee camps, hospitals, schools, and entire neighborhoods
bombed," said Tlaib. "He's seen dead children pulled from the rubble
in their pajamas, and rather than work for a cease-fire he's sending more
weapons to keep the massacres going."
The
International Criminal Court is currently conducting a war crimes investigation
in the occupied Palestinian territories.
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