WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Senator Peter Welch (D-Vt.) today released the following statement opposing the Trump Administration’s plan to sell $2.8 billion of munitions to Israel:
“As if the past two years of appalling death, destruction, and political and economic turmoil across the Middle East were not enough, it was reported yesterday that the Trump Administration has proposed another $2.8 billion sale—using American taxpayer funds—of heavy bombs to Israel. This despite the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, sharply declining support for Israel among the American people, and outright repudiation in this country of the failed war against Iran.
“We’re told the sale will include 60,000 one- and two-ton bombs—munitions that have already turned Gaza into a sea of rubble and killed tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians who are not our enemies. More than two million Palestinians, including hundreds of thousands of children, now live amongst the devastation with little access to food, shelter, basic medical care, potable water, or any way to earn an income, as winter approaches.
“Having destroyed Gaza, the only conceivable explanation for this ill-conceived sale is to reaffirm the Administration’s unconditional support for the policies of the Netanyahu government in Lebanon and the West Bank and to prolong Donald Trump’s disastrous, unnecessary war against Iran. The war is strongly opposed by the American people and has failed to achieve any of his shifting goals. The president’s war of choice has caused the cost of living for average American families to skyrocket, with no end in sight.
“Congress can, and must, stop this. We must end the senseless involvement of the United States in a reckless war, which has killed and wounded Americans; cost on average $246 million per day; caused immense suffering of innocent people; wreaked havoc on the global energy economy; drastically reduced our stockpiles of munitions that will cost tens of billions of dollars to replace while exposing, once again, the limits of American military power; severely damaged our international reputation; and not made us, Israel, or our other Middle East allies safer.
“More bombs for the extremist Netanyahu government, which violates the laws of armed conflict with impunity, will only extend this foreign policy and humanitarian catastrophe. The American people are overwhelmingly against it. As their chosen representatives, we in Congress have a responsibility to finally say: enough.”
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