Palestinians sue Blinken over continued US military aid to Israel despite rights abuses

A group of five Palestinians living in the US and Gaza filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against US Secretary of State Antony Blinken over accusations that Washington is not abiding by a law that they say should restrict American military aid to Israel because it is engaged in human rights violations in its war on Gaza.

The lawsuit, which was filed with the help of the rights group Democracy for the Arab World Now, centres around the Leahy Law, which restricts the US from providing arms or military assistance to foreign militaries that violate human rights.

According to the plaintiffs, as well as several former State Department officials who've backed the lawsuit, the complaint outlines how the Biden administration created loopholes that allowed Israel to continue committing human rights violations without a suspension of aid from Washington.

One such loophole is the State Department's establishment of the "Israel Leahy Vetting Forum", which the lawsuit says is designed "to impede any prompt and effective determination that Israeli units have committed" grave violations of human rights.

"I sat as part of the Israel Leahy Vetting Forum and saw repeatedly cases of gross violations of human rights being brought forward and senior officials being unwilling to act upon them because of fear of political consequences," Josh Paul, a former State Department official who resigned last October, said during a press conference about the lawsuit on Tuesday. 

The lawsuit also noted that in April, the State Department determined that five Israeli security units had committed grave human rights violations.

But Washington determined that four of them had remedied the violations, and could still receive US security assistance, while the administration said that the fifth unit would "remain indefinitely eligible while the State Department engaged with the government of Israel 'on identifying a path to effective remediation of this unit'," according to the lawsuit.

'My family is living a nightmare... The weapons being used against them - the bombs, the artillery, the ammunition - almost all of it comes from the United States'

- Ahmed Moor, Palestinian writer

Middle East Eye reached out to the State Department for comment but did not receive a response by time of publication.

The lawsuit comes more than 14 months into Israel's war on Gaza, which began after the 7 October 2023 attacks on southern Israel that were led by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups. Israel responded with a full declaration of war, and immediately began a devastating aerial bombing campaign, followed by a ground invasion of Gaza.

So far, the Palestinian health ministry in Gaza - which has been severely lacking in resources throughout the war - has placed the number of Palestinians killed by Israel at over 45,000. Other estimates state that the death toll could be more than 186,000.

Families 'destroyed by American weapons'

"My family members are people just like you and me, and their lives have been destroyed by American weapons in direct violation of American law," Ahmed Moor, a Palestinian writer from Gaza who now lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, said during a press conference on Tuesday.

Moor said that seven of his relatives in Gaza have been displaced multiple times by Israel's military, and are now living in Rafah, where more than a million Palestinians have been forcibly displaced to since the start of the war.

In November 2023, Israeli forces killed Moor's 19-year-old nephew.

"My family is living a nightmare. The daily search for food and water is desperate, and they live under a constant fear of the next bombardment or drone attack. The weapons being used against them - the bombs, the artillery, the ammunition - almost all of it comes from the United States," Moor said.

"These weapons are provided [to Israel] despite US laws that are designed to prevent the provision to actors that commit human rights violations."

The lawsuit is the latest attempt by Palestinians living in the US and Gaza to hold the American government accountable for its continued military support for Israel amid the ongoing war on Gaza, which legal experts, human rights groups and several countries have labelled a genocide being perpetrated by Israel.

In September, Democracy for the Arab World Now filed a similar lawsuit against the State Department, calling on it to release documents related to allegations of human rights abuses by the Israeli military.

And last November, several Palestinians living in both the US and Gaza filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration, accusing Washington of failing to prevent "an unfolding genocide" in Gaza.

That lawsuit, filed with the help of the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), was dismissed by a federal court in California, and a three-judge panel at an appeals court reaffirmed the dismissal. However, the CCR has since filed an en banc petition for a rehearing, which would require an 11-judge panel to take another look at the case.