cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/33487836
By MEE staff
Published date: 21 July 2025 21:11 BSTThe New York lawmaker voted against an amendment by Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene last week that sought to block $500m in Congress’ annual defence spending bill for Israel’s Iron Dome programme.
Fellow Democrats Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar [as well as Democrats Al Green of Texas, Summer Lee of Pennsylvania and Republican Thomas Massie of Kentucky - PL] had supported Taylor Greene’s amendment, which eventually lost in a 422-6 vote.
In a post on X on Saturday, Ocasio-Cortez claimed that Greene’s amendment did “nothing to cut off offensive aid to Israel nor end the flow of US munitions being used in Gaza”.
Big swing and a miss for AOC there.
AOC doesn’t miss. You’re not listening to her or paying attention to the details/fine print. You can fuckin bet she is
You just posted evidence that you respond to clickbait headlines without knowing what the article says or is even about. Hallmark of a conservative voter
Why is this a miss?
AOC’s defense of her vote is a swing and a miss because it rests on a false distinction. She claims the amendment only cuts funding for the Iron Dome (a “defensive” system) and not for the bombs killing Palestinians, but that’s misleading.
The Iron Dome isn’t neutral; it enables Israel to continue bombing Gaza with impunity by shielding it from retaliation. It’s part of the war apparatus, not separate from it.
By opposing this amendment, AOC helped maintain the full structure of US military aid that underwrites the genocide she says she opposes. Her rationale sounds nuanced, but in practice, it protects the status quo.
And while she says she’s focused on cutting offensive munitions, the reality is that the US is sending Israel billions in lethal aid right now, and this amendment was a chance to actually stop some of it. Voting against it doesn’t show strategy; it shows inconsistency and a failure to act when it counts. If you’re serious about ending genocide, like she keeps insisting she is, you take every shot you can. This was one, and she missed it.
The iron dome protects innocents. Thats why its important. Offensive capabilities need to be cut.
It protects the genocidal state of Israel from retaliation. If you want to protect innocents, fund an iron dome for Gaza instead of 2,000lbs bombs to drop on tents.
Because knowing that a response to your aggression is harmless lets you get away with being aggressive. So funding their defense system allows Israel to attack countries in the region, killing people without any due process.
RTFA*
? I googled and checked urban dictionary but it didn’t help.
It’s a variation of the fairly well known “read the fucking manual” (RTFM) only in this case it’s referring to the article, not the manual. Also, there was a typo
Read Fucking The Article.
Ah, not much I can do if they flub the acronym then. Thanks for the clarification.
Cutting off defense seems like a dumb move and I agree with AOC on this. We should cease all offensive weaponry sales as that’s clearly being used in a god damn genocide.
Cutting defense means they would have to shift the budget to defense.
Moreover you’re helping the aggressor protect itself against finding out the consequences of their own action.
Fuck that noise.
Moreover you’re helping the aggressor protect itself against finding out the consequences of their own action.
You literally sound like the pro-genocide people with that statement.
You understand that the Iron Dome is why Israel felt it had the impunity to strike Iran and continued to act belligerent in the region right?
Furthermore withholding all Munitions to a state facilitating genocide is the bare minimum. Regardless of the intended purpose any Munition can be turned offensive.
Finally even if Israel didn’t have the resupply for the Iron Dome and had to supply their own budget it would not guarantee a genocide against the Israeli people. Saying anything of the such is stupid and undermines the control of the United States has in that area with its massive aircraft carriers that carry the power of a small state with them.
I don’t know why you’re directing all that at me. I just said they sounded the exact same as the pro-genocide arguments I’ve heard.
Explain how the statement is pro genocide?
Literally giving aid to Palestinians or threatening to stop funding Israel is seen as helping the aggressor protect itself from the consequences of their actions. Pretty straightforward. A lot of people see all the genocide as 100% justified.
Hamas did some really brutal shit. That doesn’t justify murdering people.
Only person here making pro-genocide arguments here is you.
Fucking both-siding genocidal fuck.
You’re not clever and it is clear what you are doing.
Edit: to be absolutely clear: you are pro-genocide and you’re trying to justify it by sounding anti-genocide. But you, personally, are bad at rheoteric, and it would be clear to a child what you are doing.
Israel should be their own nation. No money for anything to a country committing genocide.
How does restricting Israel’s defense assets from the United States, which they are perfectly capable of manufacturing on their own, result in murdering people? Is the United States immediately going to strike Israel with missiles?
The only people claiming that giving Aid to Palestinians is funding terrorists are Israel in the United States everybody else pretty universally agrees they giving Aid the Palestinians is not funding “terrorist” groups. This is an especially stupid example given the fact that Bibi has admitted to funding Isis groups to disrupt Hamas activities as recently as last month.
a lot of people all see the genocide as 100% Justified.
Yeah so did the Germans in World War II. That’s a wonderful argument you’re making. 🤦
So I’m going to predict you’re not going to give me a straight answer because you and I both know what the answer actually is. But let’s try this again so that you can at least try to prove that you’re not just a fool who came in here without any fact to back up your opinion.
How does removing $500 million of United States tax dollars from the Israeli defense assets endorse genocide, and as a follow-up, justify murder?
Would you find supplying Nazi Germany defensive weapons during the Holocaust to be acceptable?
Of course not, because those defensive weapons are still used to embolden their genocidal actions
Of course not. And I don’t support funding Israel while they’re committing genocide either.
My problem was with their rhetoric. It’s literally the justification people use to support genocide. My only point was be careful how far you go with that.
Why should anyone care what a war criminal supporting person like yourself insinuates? You lost all right to have your opinion listened to when you supported that stuff. Zionists have committed war crimes and should be banned en masse from lemmy. You are no better than a nazi yourself.
I absolutely don’t support it. What the IDF has done is horrific.
I’ve seen people justifying Hamas butchering people though, which is worrying.
Do you condemn Nat Turner?
Do you condemn the Warsaw Uprising?
I notice you don’t answer those questions because it might make you think uncomfortable thoughts.
Come on, if you’re so moral have the courage of your convictions. Either explain how those were different or condemn them. If not, you’re just a jackass with no moral code other than “this feels icky”
Okay, but on the other hand, if they stopped providing defence aid to israel, they could then say that they stopped financing them and did enough, so they don’t have to stop offence funding for their genocide
Funding is funding.
Cut it all off.
Why are we responsible for Israel’s defense? they have free health care and education but our checkbook is open for iron dome missiles for them ? No. Thats American taxpayer money, not theirs. If they are rich enough to bribe the entire American government, then they are rich enough to buy their own missiles.
I bet that the US gets a lot of intel about the other countries in the region in return.
More than that, Isreal is basically a forward opperating base of the US in the middle east. They’re just the US with Groucho Marx glasses on, our sock puppet for genocide and imperialism.
Thats just not true at all.
If true, then why doesnt Israel allow any actual operational bases inside Israel? There are no US warplanes flying out of Israel, and there never have been. They fly out of Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan-- which is actually a forward operating base that you pretend Israel is, and hosts British planes too. It was a big celebration when a navy ship was allowed to dock and resupply in israel in 2018, after no US warship had been allowed to dock in Israel in the previous 20 years.
The US has a shared radar site in the negev that has 10 people staffing it, that they are just now talking about building a barracks for, and also what they call a “base within a base” AKA a desk inside a Israeli military base. Not operational. Israel is not a FOB for the US, nor is it a “giant aircraft carrier” for the US.
The US doesn’t need its own troops there if the IDF acts on their behalf and they get to claim deniability. There’s only a thin veil of secrecy, you can see through it in the ridiculous ways they’ve been allowed (and supported) in infiltrating US politics. Hell you can’t even be a school teacher in Texas without pledging support to Israel.
I see a lot of people thinking the US must be ordering israel around as a proxy. Less people believe its possible that Israel could be controlling the US.
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It seems to me that whenever a vote for Israel comes up in US congress, it gets almost 100% of the vote, which seldom happens on any other issue.
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the US government is run almost completely by lobbying (bribes) whereas the Israeli government is less so.
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AIPAC sends handlers that tell us congressman how to vote. The US doesnt do that in Israel.
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The US has baes all over the region, but arent allowed in Israel.
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The Us historicallt yhas gained nothing by supporting Israel. No oil. No land. Just trouble. If they were a puppet, they’d be doing actions that accrue benefits to the US.
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Thats speculative, and even if true, its not worth the cost, or the problems allying with israel creates. Israel is not useful to the US and never have been. Its all cost.
Yes, it is speculative. That is what it means when a sentence starts with “I bet”.
According to her, she voted no to this bill. I’m very confused by this article.
She didn’t vote yes to the amendment to the bill to remove defensive funding. She voted no to the whole bill the amendment applied to IIRC.
Ahh, gotcha, so this is just a shit stirring article that tries to send a very misleading message
Yuuup
Gotcha. That makes more sense and I wish articles about this kind of thing made it clearer.
It was an amendment to remove funding for the iron dome. She voted against the amendment.
She voted against an amendment that would block funds for Israel’s Iron Dome “defensive” missile system, while Tlaib, Omar, Summer Lee and Al Green of Texas voted for it, along with 2 Republicans.
Manipulative title, fuck off.
But no blood on the doors or Schumer or Jefferies.
This whole shitshow is just the octillionth example of the left biting its own dick off instead of attacking the fascists stomping on it.
regardless of the position on “Israel” genocide, this is tax money going to a foreign country.
The people in the comments saying that the Iron Dome allows Israel to continue to pogrom Palestinians are hypocrites and nihilists. It is technically true. Israel without a defense system would be destroyed very quickly, becoming like Gaza and unable to do anything. But don’t mask this as if this would somehow bring peace in any way other than that after a complete nuclear holocaust, the earth would be peaceful. Just say you want Israel to be wiped off from the map.
Israel shouldn’t exist. It’s a country that literally stole land from Palestine.
The real reason:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/17/pro-israel-money-progressives-congress-challenges
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/03/03/aipac-israel-spending-democratic-primaries-00144552
https://www.commondreams.org/news/aipac-100-million
https://abcnews.go.com/538/pro-israel-groups-spent-big-oust-squad-members/story?id=113675889
So, we have MTG voting to not fund and AOC to fund? What’s going on? Is the earth now spinning in reverse or something?
No, RTFA
Yes XYZB.
↑↑↓↓←→←→BA
Did you actually read the article? If you did, did you catch the word salad in her X‑post? She’s basically trusting that when we say “this money is for your defense system, the Iron Dome” Israel will actually use it just for the Iron Dome, and only the Iron Dome.
Also, does this make sense to you at all? Like do you agree with this?“Along with other US-funded interceptor systems, the Iron Dome has emboldened Israel to invade or bomb no less than five different countries in the past two years.”
Israel isn’t such an honest country that they’ll use the money we send them according to our allocations. She fucked up big time and now she’s trying to defend her fuck up and is doing a terrible job.
Didn’t pass the purity test. Back to being a field slave. Also, you personally aren’t doing enough and are therefore colluding with the oppressors. I am infallible.
You are allowed to say you like progressive policies and also hate giving weapons to genociders.
So we want civilians to be killed by rocket attacks now?
That makes it clear this “pro-Palestinian” movement is not actually against civilians being killed… they actually do want civilians to die. It’s just they want only civilians of a specific ethnicity to die.
Fellow Democrats Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar [as well as Democrats Al Green of Texas, Summer Lee of Pennsylvania and Republican Thomas Massie of Kentucky - PL] had supported Taylor Greene’s amendment, which eventually lost in a 422-6 vote.
So there’s a willingness of the “pro-Palestinian” movement to ally itself with anti-semites of the nationalist white supremacist variety. Nationalists and “socialists” finding common ground in their hatred of Jews. Where have I heard this one before?
you’re being so disingenuous
Oh, so you honestly believe Marjorie Taylor Greene suddenly has sympathy for the “pro-Palestinian” cause? Or is it possible she might have some other motivation for this amendment? What do you think MTG’s motives are?
MTG absolutely did this because she’s an anti-semitic freak who believes in jewish space lasers. But you’re being disingenuous because it’s obvious the co-signers aren’t interested in her motivations.
What do you call two people voting with an antisemite? Three antisemites.
Look at the vote count. It was never going to pass. It wouldn’t have changed the outcome no matter which way they voted, so it’s purely a vote indicating their principles. They could’ve abstained (refusing to vote with nutjob MTG but also refusing to vote for funding), but instead voted with MTG to signal that they are fine with being in alignment with white supremacist antisemitism.
But now we know their principles are to vote with an antisemite to indicate they want Israeli civilians to die.
My friend, you are drawing an arbitrary line. I do not believe you’d respect those reps abstaining any more than you do their votes for the amendment.
Now who’s being disingenuous?
Wait so, you would be ok with countries giving money to Hitler so they can build defense systems in Germany?
Not only this but I wouldn’t trust a genocidal maniac state in not using this money for other military purposes. The best way of keeping civilians alive is ending the war not stoking it. Moreover such blocks can actually force Israel to transfer some of its offensive resources back to defensive. Not that I believe MTG’s intentions were good.
Going full Godwin right out of the gate?
An odd move to make given you’re aligning with a self described nationalist like MTG. I’d think given the position you’re taking you’d want to downplay the references to Nazis.
I would say the same for you given that MGT’s intensions are more likely to create a smear campaign than defend any particular ideology. And it is a good one I will give her that, whether or not AOC voted yes or no for this, she would be able to stoke a smear campaign one way or the other.
To be frank, I don’t think she has any particular ideology that she is attached to anyway, it is more like there are some ideologies that she uses as a tool.
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