Once again, the Biden administration is delaying the approval of licenses for the sale of more than 20,000 U.S.-manufactured rifles to Israel.
This decision, as reported by two U.S. officials to Axios, stems from concerns regarding attacks by extremist Israeli settlers against Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank.
The move to subject the rifle deal to another review by the State Department reflects ongoing worries within the Biden administration about the Israeli government’s perceived lack of adequate measures to control violence perpetrated by extremist settlers.
During the initial week of the conflict, Israel had requested these rifles for civilian initial response teams in Israeli villages near the borders with Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria.
These local teams, comprising residents who receive weapons and training from the Israeli police, serve as first responders in the event of a terror attack, Axios reported.
However, the Biden administration approached the Israeli request cautiously, expressing concerns that Itamar Ben Gvir, the ultra-nationalist minister of national security overseeing the police, might distribute the rifles to extremist settlers in the West Bank, according to U.S. officials.
Despite initial approval by the Biden administration and Congress for the export licenses to U.S. defense companies, ensuring that the weapons would not be allocated to civilian teams in Jewish settlements, the U.S. State Department later opted to slow down the process.
The decision to subject the licenses to a new review, as indicated by U.S. officials, was prompted by the Biden administration’s perception that the Israeli government was not taking sufficient action to address settler violence, with accusations that the U.S. is “inflating the issue.”
Written by B.C. Begley
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B.C. Begley 