Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a US representative, said on Wednesday that she will oppose any future US military aid to Israel, including for defensive systems.
In a statement on social media, Ocasio-Cortez said that Israel was fully capable of funding “Iron Dome and other defensive systems”, and that “consistent with my voting record to date, I will not support Congress sending more taxpayer dollars and military aid to a government that consistently ignores international law and US law”.
Her remarks on Wednesday follow reports that she pledged to oppose any future military aid to Israel during a New York City Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) forum on Tuesday evening.
“Our allies who need our military aid must understand that we will provide it consistent with the Leahy amendment and the foreign assistance act”, Ocasio-Cortez added, referring to a law which prohibits the US from providing military support to army units that violate human rights.
According to City & State, which obtained a partial recording of the DSA forum, Ocasio-Cortez told members: “I have not once ever voted to authorize funding to Israel, and I will never,” adding that “the Israeli government should be able to finance their own weapons if they seek to arm themselves.”
Uh… It’s nice that she’s finally gotten the memo, but is she gaslighting us?
The downvoters in this thread do not live in reality.
So to clarify, her main viewpoint is essentially “I voted against reducing these munitions deals with Israel, because these munitions are intended for defensive purpose?”
Edit: Thank the both of you, and anyone else who feels willing to contribute, for providing the explaination.
Basically yes, because AOC accepted the framing that there is such a thing as defensive weapons funding. The rest of her cohort, Talib, Omar, Lee, others, did not make this same mistake.
The article this thread is associated with, is AOC’s pivot on this issue: AOC no longer accepts the framing that weapons funding can be defensive.
It needs to be clear: AOC no longer supports the position in the above tweet. AOC recognized that her position in 2025 regarding defensive weapons was wrong.
I took it as “I voted against a bill that would cut off defensive munitions funding but not offensive munitions funding.”
I forget what this whole bill/amendment was, but defensive protection of civilians, or the illusion thereof, gives genocidal impunity. If Israel had to pay for some portion of “weapons” given to them then that is less support for Israel which has traditionally received full gifted aid.
When you fund body armour and masks for ICE, you empower them to murder traffic that is too slow to clear. (renee good)
All funding for zionazi Israel is used for genocide. The funding of water for Israel is support for genocide. Republicans say that reimbursing medicare expenses of hospitals in California promoted illegal immigration, even though it is a contractual reimbursement, because if California was forced to repay hospitals, it would have less money somehow to support immigrants.
Exactly. And in 2021, AOC thought she could have it both ways, and got heat from the anti-zionists on this matter. In 2025, she got her ankles broken by MTG on the issue. Truly an unforced error on her part and not one she should have been making in the first place when Omar, Talib, Lee, others, weren’t making the same mistakes. She should have asked her colleagues to educate her.
Now she’s getting on the right side of things. Great. But it doesn’t speak well to her instincts to be johnny-come-lately to something she should have been a leader on (if she aspires to Senate or Pres).
in general she’s not well versed on international issues. her core guiding pricipals are good, but she frequetly misses the forest for the trees
Yes: https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2024128, https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2023681, https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/202428