“Incomprehensible”: U.S. Approves $20 Billion in New Arms for Israel as Gaza Death Toll Tops 40,000
"Health officials in Gaza said Thursday that the official death toll from Israel’s 10-month war has topped 40,000, though that is believed to be a vast undercount of the true figure. The grim milestone was reached just days after the Biden administration greenlit $20 billion in additional weapons sales to Israel, including 50 F-15 fighter jets, tank ammunition, mortar rounds, tactical vehicles and advanced air-to-air missiles. The U.S. approved the sales despite growing calls for an arms embargo on Israel. “This is just a continuation of a policy that has been going on now for 10 months of the U.S. providing to Israel all the arms that it requests,” says Josh Paul, a veteran State Department official who worked on arms deals and resigned in protest over Gaza policy in October. “It is a dark day for American foreign policy.” We also speak with Jan Egeland, the secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, who says it’s “incomprehensible” that the U.S. keeps supplying Israel with weapons. “There should be no more arms going into that place before there is a ceasefire.”
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Health officials in Gaza say the official death toll from Israel’s 10-month war has now topped 40,000, but that figure is widely believed to be an undercount.
We begin today’s show looking at how the Biden administration has just approved $20 billion in additional weapon sales to Israel. The weapon sales will include 50 F-15 fighter jets, tank ammunition, high-explosive mortars, tactical vehicles and advanced air-to-air missiles.
The State Department approved the sales despite growing calls for the U.S. to impose an arms embargo on Israel. In April, the majority of nations on the U.N. Human Rights Council supported a resolution calling for all countries to halt weapon sales to Israel to, quote, “prevent further violations of international humanitarian law and violations and abuses of human rights.”
AMY GOODMAN: On Wednesday, Vermont independent Senator Bernie Sanders appeared on CNN and criticized President Biden’s support of Israel.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS: I believe that the Biden administration has been probably the most progressive administration in the United States since Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Biden said he wanted to be — he wanted to do that, and I think he has kept his word. And Kamala Harris has been by his side. So, on domestic issues, they have a whole lot to be proud of.
But I think the president has been wrong in terms of his support for Netanyahu. I happen to agree with the International Criminal Court that what Netanyahu is doing in Gaza, the massive killings, the destruction of the healthcare system, the destruction of housing, the bombing of every university, and now creating a situation where tens of thousands of children face starvation — the United States, in my view, should not be providing another nickel to Netanyahu and his war machine. That’s my view. President Biden disagrees with that.
Do I think that will have an impact among young people, among some progressives? I do. But at the end of the day, I think most progressives will say he is wrong, the president is wrong on Gaza, but the alternative is Donald Trump, and that is not an acceptable alternative. So, we have got to keep pushing the administration to change its views regarding funding for the Israeli war machine, but we have got to defeat Donald Trump and elect Kamala Harris.
AMY GOODMAN: Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, appearing on CNN.
We’re joined right now by Josh Paul, veteran State Department official who worked on arms deals and resigned last year in protest of the push to increase arms sales to Israel amidst its assault on Gaza. He’s a former director of the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs in the State Department, where he worked for 11 years. He’s now a senior adviser at DAWN.
Welcome back to Democracy Now!, Josh. Thanks so much for joining us. I wanted to ask you about this $20 billion. Now, that announcement came just after last weekend, when the Israeli military struck a school with a mosque within it. Over a hundred Palestinians were killed. And CNN confirmed that a U.S.-made GBU-39 small diameter bomb was used in that strike, which resulted in, quote, “over 100 pieces of people,” as was described by one Palestinian journalist. They couldn’t find a whole body intact afterwards. It was after that that the U.S. announced they would be moving ahead on $3.5 billion in military sales to Israel, and then, a day later, announcing the $20 billion sale. Can you explain what this is all about?
JOSH PAUL: Well, sadly, I think this is just a continuation of a policy that has been going on now for 10 months of the U.S. providing to Israel all the arms that it requests. The only difference is that for months the administration has been functioning with sales that have already been notified to Congress, and so hasn’t had to go back publicly. Now it has to go back publicly, because it has reached the limits of those previous authorizations.
I don’t know how one looks at that bombing of the school that you described or the killing of the twin babies that you just described at the top of your show, or, indeed, at the Israeli government officials who are advocating for the rape of detainees, and provide — go ahead and provide these weapons and then look yourself in the mirror. It is a dark day for American foreign policy, and a stain, I think.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Josh Paul, could you talk about the date, the time lag between when the weapons will actually be delivered? The Associated Press noted, “The weapons are not expected to get to Israel anytime soon, they are contracts that will take years to fulfill.” So, can the sales still be contested and even stopped?
JOSH PAUL: Sure. So, first of all, on the timing of the deliveries, the F-15s will take at least three to five years to build and will not be delivered until 2029. What is interesting in the notifications is that, very unusually, the notifications also include delivery dates for the tank and mortar ammunition. The dates in the notifications say 2026. That is the manufacturer’s delivery date. Once the sale is approved, there is nothing to stop the U.S. government from providing these same equipment, these same munitions out of U.S. Army stocks and then backfilling itself as the supplies come off the production line. So, I think that we could very well see some of these deliveries occurring within weeks.
In terms of what can be done about this, first let’s look at the timing. You know, these sales have been pending for several weeks, several months in some cases. It’s interesting that they come after Prime Minister Netanyahu’s visit. That is a way, I think, of avoiding having sort of congressional action ongoing to try and block these sales while he was here. They also come several months before the election, in the dead of August. And I think that that is also an intentional act by the administration to try and put some space between these sales and the friction that they will cause with much of the Democratic base and those upcoming elections.
I think it’s also worth noting, of course, that the one thing Prime Minister Netanyahu actually made a solid ask for when he spoke before Congress was for faster weapons transfers. And by giving him precisely that, the Biden administration is not only, you know, giving Prime Minister Netanyahu again what he wants, but also strengthening Prime Minister Netanyahu’s hand domestically, letting him show Israel that he can come to America, make a demand and have it met. And I think that is extremely disruptive not only to the pressure or any pressure we are trying to place to push Israel towards a ceasefire agreement, but also towards that ceasefire agreement itself. Why should Prime Minister Netanyahu make any concessions when the U.S. continues to do everything he asked us to?
Finally, yes, so there are steps Congress can take. Unfortunately, the administration has notified these sales during a congressional recess. There are 15 days until the administration can move forward with offering what we call the letters of offer and acceptance — essentially, the contracts — to Israel. Congress will not have returned in time to prevent that. But once it is back, Congress can introduce, and the Senate can introduce, joint resolutions of disapproval to attempt to block these sales. Those will not succeed, but they will prompt a much-overdue debate on the Senate floor.
AMY GOODMAN: Also, though, the timing of this being right before the Democratic convention, where protests are planned for the Biden administration — that is, President Biden and Vice President Harris — the Biden administration’s support of Netanyahu with these military sales. Why would they do this right before?
JOSH PAUL: Well, I think that, look, first of all, there’s no good time to do this from any perspective, right? I think that they are coordinating and continuing to walk a very tight line between demonstrating what will be, I do expect, a President Harris’s continuing support for Israel, while also trying to lean into arguments about the need for increased humanitarian assistance, the need for a ceasefire. And I think we will see the Harris camp speak more to those sorts of issues. But, you know, at the same time, President Biden remains the president, and this is his policy, and there have not been any changes to it.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Talk more about that, the ceasefire. A new round of Gaza ceasefire and hostage talks are beginning today in Doha, Qatar. The talks are being organized by the United States, Egypt and Qatar. Hamas has said it will not send representatives to the talks. A senior Hamas official told Reuters, quote, “Going to new negotiations allows the occupation to impose new conditions and employ the maze of negotiation to conduct more massacres.” The talks are the first to be held since Israel assassinated Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh, who had been Hamas’s chief negotiator. So, if you could comment, Josh Paul, on what you think the significance of these talks are, and the fact that, actually, Secretary of State Blinken was scheduled to be in the Middle East but has now postponed his visit?
JOSH PAUL: Well, first of all, let us hope and pray that these talks succeed, because Gaza desperately needs an immediate and permanent ceasefire. And while Secretary Blinken may not be there, CIA Director Bill Burns, who is an extremely capable diplomat, will be there. So, I think we should all hope.
At the same time, as you just mentioned, of course, you know, within the last few weeks, Israel killed the leader of Hamas and also their lead negotiator, Ismail Haniyeh. And that does not seem like the action of a government that is intent on recovering its hostages from Hamas’s grip. You know, one does not kill the person you are negotiating with and then expect to achieve a ceasefire. So, I think the odds remain very long.
I think it also remains very much in Prime Minister Netanyahu’s domestic political interest, as he sees it, that he not be seen to be making any sorts of concessions to Hamas. So, I am, unfortunately, as I think most of us are, very skeptical that we will see a breakthrough. But let us hope that we do.
AMY GOODMAN: In a moment, we’re going to be talking about what’s happening in Colombia, but we want to bring Jan Egeland into this discussion with Josh Paul. Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, who is joining us from Bogotá, Colombia. But we wanted to ask you, as you’ve long called for a ceasefire, and on this day when the death toll in Gaza has topped 40,000 Palestinians, expected in fact to be far higher than that, your thoughts on the U.S. right now approving, moving forward with $20 billion in arms sales to Israel.
JAN EGELAND: Well, I must say, for me, as a humanitarian, with lots of humanitarian colleagues on the ground in Gaza, I find it incomprehensible that the U.S. is continuing to provide indiscriminate weapons to an indiscriminate warfare in a place where the population is trapped — there is no escape from Gaza — and where we are prevented from really helping them with sufficient humanitarian aid. There should be no more arms going into that place before there is a ceasefire.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, I’d like to go back to Josh Paul to talk about U.S. arms sales also to Saudi Arabia. The Biden administration has decided to resume sending offensive arms to Saudi Arabia, lifting a ban that had been in place since 2021. The U.S. had halted offensive arms sales three years ago amid public outcry over Saudi Arabia’s role in the devastating war in Yemen. Josh Paul, your response to that decision by the Biden administration?
JOSH PAUL: Well, I think it’s just another example of the elevation of politics over human life. These air-to-ground munitions and the transfer of air-to-ground munitions from the U.S. to Saudi were, as you say, halted in the context of what have been tens of thousands of civilian casualties caused by U.S. weapons at the hands of the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen. You know, we have seen no evidence to date that the Royal Saudi Air Force, if faced with the same context, would act any differently. Yes, the United States has worked to make the Saudi Air Force and enable them to be more accurate, but the big question is: Would they be any more discriminate? And I don’t think we’ve seen anything to suggest that the Saudi Air Force would act in a different way.
And so, advancing these weapon sales is really an olive branch from the Biden administration to try and keep Saudi Arabia onside as they continue to push this normalization deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel and this security pact between Saudi Arabia and the U.S. It’s a sign that, “Hey, you know, please hang in there. We’re still working on this.” Unfortunately, it could very well come at the cost of future civilian lives.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Josh Paul, we want to thank you for being with us, veteran State Department official who worked on arms deals and resigned in protest over the push to increase arms sales to Israel amidst its assault on Gaza. He’s former director in the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs of the State Department, where he worked for 11 years, now a senior adviser at DAWN.
Coming up, we’ll continue with Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, about what’s happening in Colombia today. And we’ll also talk to him about Sudan, where peace talks are supposed to be underway in Geneva. Stay with us."
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