US to approve $680mn arms sale to Israel

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US President Joe Biden has provisionally approved a $680mn weapons sale to Israel, a fresh shipment of precision weapons that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cited as one reason for backing a ceasefire with Hizbollah.

US officials recently briefed Congress on the plan to provide thousands of additional joint direct attack munition kits to Israel, known as Jdams, as well as hundreds of small-diameter bombs, according to people familiar with the matter. The disclosure of such a planned arms sale, which Congress can raise objections to, typically comes before the public announcement of a deal.

The planned sale, which has not previously been reported, comes as Israel and Hizbollah begin to implement a fragile US-brokered ceasefire to stop more than a year of fighting on the Israel-Lebanon border.

Netanyahu claimed on Tuesday that topping up weapons supplies was one of three main reasons for the ceasefire, saying the pause in fighting would “give our forces a breather and replenish stocks”.

“It is no secret that there have been big delays in weapons and munitions deliveries,” the Israeli leader said. “These delays will be resolved soon. We will receive supplies of advanced weaponry that will keep our soldiers safe and give us more strike force to complete our mission.”

But US officials have denied there is any explicit link between the ceasefire deal and approval for the latest weapons delivery. While the ceasefire deal includes a so-called side letter from the US to Israel, setting out Washington’s support for a certain freedom of Israeli action, people familiar with the text said it included no guarantees of weapon sales.

US officials also deny that there have been deliberate delays to weapons shipments, aside from shipments of 2,000lb bombs, which Biden paused earlier this year over concerns about their use in densely populated areas of Gaza.

Biden administration officials have pressed ahead with weapons sales to Israel even amid mounting concerns over the humanitarian toll in Gaza.

The $680mn for Jdams and small-diameter bombs is on top of about $20bn in weapons sales that Senate Democrats, led by Bernie Sanders, tried and failed to block last week over concerns about the mounting civilian death toll in Gaza.

Congress passed $26bn in additional wartime aid for Israel in April, which augments the annual $3.8bn in security assistance the US provides to Israel.

The Biden administration in October had threatened to withhold military aid to Israel if it did not take steps to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza and set a 30-day deadline for conditions to improve.

But even after aid deliveries into Gaza fell to record lows, the US state department withdrew the threat, saying it was satisfied that Israel had taken steps to improve the humanitarian situation.

The reversal sparked significant outcry from rights groups, which said Israel had not met any of the specific criteria the US laid out and charged that Palestinians in the shattered enclave were being “starved.”

President-elect Donald Trump is expected to do less to try to rein in Israel’s military effort in Gaza, though he has also expressed a desire to see Israel end its war with Hamas.