[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 39 (Tuesday, March 5, 2024)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1100-S1101]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                                 Israel

  Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, every day we are reminded of the worsening 
humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza. Most of the infrastructure in the 
territory has been destroyed. Thousands of apartment buildings, 
schools, mosques, hospitals, shops, and markets have been reduced to 
piles of twisted metal and rubble, under which the bodies of an unknown 
number of people are buried.
  Of the world's many humanitarian crises, the situation in Gaza is 
among the worst. This is due in large measure to the onerous 
impediments by the Netanyahu government to the delivery of sufficient 
food, water, medicines, shelter, and fuel.
  Getting aid to those who are suffering and preventing starvation 
should be our most immediate and highest priority, along with obtaining 
the release of the hostages.
  As I said when I spoke out for a cease-fire in November, an immediate 
and indefinite cease-fire is the only way to achieve these goals. I am 
very heartened by Vice President Harris's call for an immediate--if 
temporary--cease-fire to get aid in and hostages out, because the 
reality is, the supply of lifesaving aid has dwindled to a trickle.
  Last week, the depth of the humanitarian emergency in Gaza exploded 
with the deaths of dozens of Palestinian civilians as they frantically 
tried to reach food supplies from aid trucks that were guarded by 
Israeli soldiers. People were trampled, people were run over by trucks, 
and they were shot.
  It was a horrifying scene and a direct result of the Netanyahu 
government's failure to put in place workable procedures for the 
delivery of sufficient aid to starving people. As others have said, 
there is no legal or security justification for restricting 
humanitarian aid to civilians who are caught in the middle of an armed 
conflict.
  The more desperate people become, the more chaotic and precarious the 
security situation, the more likely there will be other senseless 
tragedies just like this.
  I recently introduced a resolution, along with 15 of my colleagues, 
calling for the urgent delivery of sufficient humanitarian aid.
  The Biden administration has repeatedly called for greater access for 
more aid trucks to Gaza, but the number getting through remains far 
below prewar levels. And I am encouraged, nevertheless, that President 
Biden has directed the United States to begin airdropping aid in--a 
decision made with the understanding that, while not enough by any 
means, it could save lives.
  Israel now occupies Gaza. It has an obligation under international 
law--not to mention the moral responsibility--to feed and shelter 
Palestinians under its occupation.
  Beyond the moral imperative, the path to peace, security, and 
stability would be enhanced dramatically by facilitating the delivery 
of essentials for survival to the Palestinian people whose fate is 
imperiled. But as we saw last week, that is not happening.
  The Netanyahu government's rejection of U.S. and international 
appeals to meet the basic needs of innocent Palestinians trapped in 
Gaza and the resulting loss of innocent lives, is really the latest in 
a pattern that we have seen for years.
  The United States has long supported--and the United States will 
always support--Israel as a free and Jewish democratic state. But 
candor requires acknowledging that we have an ongoing, serious 
difference with Israeli leadership.
  It is the longstanding U.S. policy that the Middle East conflict can 
only be solved through negotiations to create two independent states of 
Israel and Palestine. President Biden has reaffirmed this.
  But Prime Minister Netanyahu has publicly rejected a two-state 
solution, and he has even credited himself for actively working to 
prevent the creation of a Palestinian state. I will use his words. He 
couldn't have been more clear. He said:

       I will not compromise on full Israeli security control over 
     the entire area in the west of Jordan--and this is contrary 
     to a Palestinian state.

  The United States opposes settlements and the destruction of 
Palestinian homes, orchards, schools, and other infrastructure in the 
West Bank. It violates international law and is a severe obstacle to 
peace. Secretary of State Blinken has reaffirmed this.
  Yet Prime Minister Netanyahu embraced the settlements. In 2017, he 
said:

       We will deepen our roots, build, strengthen and settle.

  In 2019, he said:

       With God's help we will extend Jewish sovereignty to all 
     the settlements as part of the land of Israel, as part of the 
     state of Israel.

  Under his leadership, settlements have expanded exponentially. 
Settlements bring extremist settler violence, some of it with firearms 
financed by American taxpayers.
  Shootings of West Bank Palestinians, threats laced with hateful 
messages that if they don't leave their homes, they will be killed, and 
the destruction of land and other property have surged--surged--in 
recent months, including, in some instances, with Israeli soldiers 
passively standing by and watching.
  It is the longstanding U.S. policy, codified by the Leahy law, that 
units of foreign security forces that violate human rights are not 
eligible for U.S. training or equipment or other assistance.
  And according to multiple reports, that law has not been applied to 
the Israeli Defense Forces, despite numerous cases of shootings of 
Palestinian civilians.
  We must face the contradiction of what we are doing. We are 
airdropping food to famine-stricken Gaza today and supplying bombs for 
Israel to drop on devastated Gaza tomorrow.
  We call for humanitarian relief, but how can that call be meaningful 
when aid workers are killed in their effort to deliver it and 
Palestinians are killed in their effort to retrieve it?
  It is time for us to acknowledge--all of us to acknowledge--what the 
entire world knows: It is impossible to deliver humanitarian aid in a 
very active war zone.
  Israel is a great country, Jewish and democratic. Israel has been--
and remains--our closest ally in the Middle East. For decades, Israel 
has been under attack by those who have sought to destroy it.
  President Biden--and so many of us--understand the history of Israel 
and the history of the Jewish people. October 7 was the worst attack on 
the Jewish people since the Holocaust. And we cannot ever let that 
happen again.
  But both of our countries right now are on a wrong path. Israel must 
stop its indiscriminate attacks that are killing so many Palestinian 
civilians--women and children, the majority among them who perished.
  And the United States must end its unconditional support when Israeli 
policies are wrong that are unjustified; that are causing so much 
suffering; and that, in the view of many of us, are doomed to fail in 
the goal of achieving lasting peace.
  How many times do we have to be repudiated by Prime Minister 
Netanyahu on the use of indiscriminate force; on the recklessness of 
expanding West Bank settlements; on impeding the delivery of aid; on 
advocating an endless Israeli post-conflict occupation of Gaza? How 
long and how often will Prime Minister Netanyahu reject our policies 
but take our money before we say, ``Enough''?
  How many more than the 30,000 Palestinians already killed and the 
70,000

[[Page S1101]]

wounded before we say to Prime Minister Netanyahu, ``Enough''? How many 
more homes and shops and schools and childcare centers and hospitals 
must be destroyed before we say to Prime Minister Netanyahu, 
``Enough''?
  Israel must--and Israel always will--make its own decisions as to who 
will be its political leaders. Israel must and Israel always will make 
its own decisions as to when and how to defend itself. It is their 
right.

  But the United States, too, must make its own decisions consistent 
with our values, with our judgment, and with what we believe to be in 
our national interest. The Biden administration has taken important 
steps to bring accountability through diplomacy by issuing a national 
security memorandum that builds on the Leahy law, but it is time for 
us--and I include all of us in the U.S. Congress--to stop accommodating 
the Netanyahu government. It has consistently shown it does not share 
our goal of achieving peaceful coexistence between the Israeli and 
Palestinian people.
  Our failure to act damages the authority, credibility, and reputation 
of the United States, not to mention our foreign policy and security 
interests. In my view, it undermines the security interests of Israel, 
which is increasingly isolated in the international community. 
Opposition to the disproportionate use of force in Gaza is widespread, 
including in our own country. So, too, regrettably, is the rise of 
anti-Semitism, which we must always condemn, and Islamophobia, 
likewise, which we must always condemn.
  It has been said many times before: U.S. aid is not a blank check. 
When it comes to the Netanyahu government, it has, for many years, 
across Democratic and Republican administrations, been a blank check. 
It is long past time for the United States to stop supporting by 
commission and omission actions that are inconsistent with our 
principles and our policies, and which make peace between Israelis and 
Palestinians ever more elusive, ever more difficult to achieve.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.