(NewsWorthy.news) – Israel is expecting the United States to announce that it will block military aid to an Israeli Defense Forces unit over human rights abuses in the occupied West Bank from before the terrorist attacks on October 7.
The move would mark the first time in decades that a U.S. administration has invoked the “Leahy Law” against an IDF unit. The 27-year-old congressional act was championed by Democratic former Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, who said the U.S. needed a tool to block military training and aid to foreign units found guilty of rapes, torture, extrajudicial killings and other human rights abuses. The move comes as relations become increasingly strained between Tel Aviv and Washington over the amount of civilian casualties of the war in Gaza.
The U.S. State Department’s annual report has highlighted numerous human rights violations carried out in Gaza, the West Bank and Israel by several parties – including the IDF, the Palestinian authority and Hamas – before and since the October 7 attacks. Secretary of State Antony Blinken commented that both the October 7 attacks, which killed roughly 1,200 people, and Israel’s assault on Gaza, which had killed 30,000 by March 2024, raised “deeply troubling” concerns about human rights.
The report concluded that Israeli authorities in Gaza had made no visible attempts to identify and punish officials linked to human rights violations in the region. As the report relates to 2023, it does not cover the particularly controversial targeting of an international aid convoy in April 2024. Seven people were killed in the incident, and Israel’s investigation found that the IDF had violated its own regulations, resulting in the dismissal of at least two officers. In response to criticism of its attacks on hospitals in Gaza, Israel’s government has claimed that it is complying with international law.
If invoked, the Leahy Law requires an automatic end of aid to a military unit if the State Department proves that gross abuses have been committed. Another Leahy law states the same regarding training provided to foreign armies. In practice the law has mainly been invoked in countries in Africa, Latin America and the former Soviet Union and rarely regarding crucial strategic allies. Tel Aviv claims that security forces investigate human rights abuses but human rights groups have accused Biden’s administration of failing to properly investigate allegations of Israeli war crimes and human rights abuses against Palestinians.
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