{"id":13476,"date":"2024-02-05T21:22:39","date_gmt":"2024-02-05T15:52:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asia.businessupturn.com\/?p=13476"},"modified":"2024-02-05T21:22:39","modified_gmt":"2024-02-05T15:52:39","slug":"house-republicans-propose-17-6-billion-military-aid-bill-for-israel-amidst-partisan-rift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/middle-east-asia\/israel\/house-republicans-propose-17-6-billion-military-aid-bill-for-israel-amidst-partisan-rift\/13476\/","title":{"rendered":"House Republicans propose $17.6 billion military aid bill for Israel amidst partisan rift"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">House Republicans have introduced a $17.6 billion financing bill that aims to provide Israel more military support in its fight with Hamas, a move that exposes partisan splits. A House Appropriations panel introduced the idea, which is perceived as a show of solidarity for Jerusalem in the face of a deal led by the Senate that would have increased immigration enforcement at the US-Mexico border and provided funding for Ukraine.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">House Speaker Mike Johnson emphasised the critical requirement of providing $4 billion to resupply missile defence systems and $1.2 billion to counter threats posed by mortars and short-range rockets. He also stressed the urgency of assisting US forces in the region alongside Israel. In addition to the improvement of artillery and munitions manufacturing, the financial package also contains provisions for the purchase of cutting-edge weaponry.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The White House, however, swiftly put the idea aside, calling it a \u201ccynical political manoeuvre\u201d and accusing Republicans of exploiting military assistance to Israel as a political football. The $17.6 billion is divided into two categories, according to the House Appropriations Committee: $3.3 billion for ongoing US military activities in the region and $4.4 billion to restock US supplies of weapons supplied to Israel.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe need to support our closest ally and our forces in the region has never been more pressing,\u201d Speaker Mike Johnson said in defence of the action. That being said, there is still no guarantee that the bill will pass the Senate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Senate is about to present a bipartisan solution that addresses the House Republicans\u2019 idea by providing funding for help to Ukraine and proposing measures to bolster security along the southern US border. There is a disagreement with the Senate\u2019s approach since the House Republicans have insisted on linking US border controls with aid to Ukraine.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The same bill needs to pass both the House and the Senate before it can be signed into law by Democratic President Joe Biden and provide any additional military support to Israel or Ukraine. In addition, the White House announced that it will pursue humanitarian funding for Gaza; the Senate is currently considering including aid for Taiwan in its legislation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Republican idea was criticised by White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in a statement, saying, \u201cThe security of Israel should be sacred, not a political game.\u201d The statement went on to criticise the measure, claiming that it denies Palestinian civilians medical aid, does not sufficiently handle border security, and fails to support Ukraine in its struggle against Russian aggression.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Speaker Mike Johnson drew attention to the Senate\u2019s lack of engagement with the House during discussions, arguing that this precludes any legislation from being considered quickly. To make it easier for the Israel aid to pass, he emphasised how crucial it is to remove offsets.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A nearly $14.5 billion military aid package for Israel was previously passed by the House and rejected by the Senate in November. Republicans insisted on paying the law with reductions to other agencies, especially the Internal Revenue Service, which caused resistance to the plan.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A $17.6 billion bill is introduced by House Republicans to aid Israel in its battle with Hamas. The White House opposes it, referring to it as a political strategy, and supports a Senate agreement that addresses border security and Ukraine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":368,"featured_media":13483,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[322,8821,8820,316,298,8822,8493,215,8823,3143],"class_list":["post-13476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-israel","tag-hamas","tag-house-appropriations-committee","tag-house-republicans","tag-israel","tag-joe-biden","tag-mike-johnson","tag-senate","tag-ukraine","tag-us-mexico-border","tag-white-house"],"reading_time":"3 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/368"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13476\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}