WASHINGTON – Former Vice President Joe Biden Biden told a Wall Street Journal reporter on Thursday that he strongly opposes calls by other Democratic presidential candidates to condition U.S. aid to Israel on steps to end the occupation in the West Bank.
Biden said calls to use aid to Israel as leverage are “absolutely outrageous.”
Speaking at J Street’s annual conference in Washington Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders said on Monday that the aid could be used as leverage on the Israeli government. “I would use the leverage of 3.8 billion dollars – it is a lot of money – and we cannot give it ‘carte blanche’ to the Israeli government or for that matter to any government at all, we have a right to demand respect for human rights and democracy.”
“I have been on the record from very early on opposing the settlements, and I think it’s a mistake. But the idea that we would draw military assistance from Israel, on the condition that they change a specific policy, I find to be absolutely outrageous.” Biden said.
Biden added that Sanders’ suggestion was, in his view, “a gigantic mistake”, and he said that he hoped those suggestions were “taken out of context.”
As reported by Vos Iz Neias