Letter to Padilla & Butler Stop $20 billion for genocide

November 12, 2024

To: Padilla and Senator Butler and Senator Padilla:
As Sacramento area organizations concerned with a broad spectrum of human rights issues, including immigration, racism, women’s rights, Islamophobia, antisemitism, LGBTQ, workers’ rights, our unhoused neighbors, environmental justice, and other critical issues, we ask you to take definitive action now to end U.S. weapons transfers to Israel, including co-sponsoring and voting for Senate Joint Resolutions 111-116. These six resolutions, introduced by Senator Sanders,¹ would stop most of the $20 billion President Biden approved in illegal U.S. weapons sales to Israel.

Your immediate definitive action is urgently needed because:

● Israel is illegally using U.S. weapons to deliberately kill civilians and commit atrocities in Gaza, including bombing homes, schools and shelters; shooting children in the head²; burning people alive³; and deliberately running over people with tanks⁴. These egregious war crimes are in direct violation of the Foreign Assistance Act⁵ and the Arms Export Control Act⁶.

● Israel is illegally blocking humanitarian aid, including food to the people of Gaza, threatening to starve the people of northern Gaza⁷. This violates Section 620I of the Foreign Assistance Act, which prohibits U.S. aid to any country blocking U.S. humanitarian assistance.

● U.S. aid and weapons to Israel make the U.S. complicit in Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people⁸, which has already killed over 43,000 Palestinians, 40% of whom are children⁹ (17,000 children), and wounded nearly 95,000 more, mostly women, children and the elderly, with an additional 2,500 Lebanese civilians slaughtered in the past several weeks.

● Instead of funding genocide, the nearly $18 billion that the U.S. has already given Israel in the past year should have been spent, and the proposed $20 billion should be spent, on critical social needs, including affordable housing, fighting poverty, addressing climate change, access to healthcare, and other critical social needs.

Most Americans want the U.S. to stop arming Israel¹⁰. In June, 2024, a CBS poll¹¹ found 61 percent of American adults were calling for a halt on weapons transfers to Israel, including 77 percent of Democrats.

Again, we urge you to take action to stop the flow of U.S. weapons for Israel’s genocide in Gaza, including demanding an end to all U.S. weapons transfers to Israel and co-sponsoring and voting for Senate Joint Resolutions 111-116.

We look forward to hearing from you on this critical request.

Sincerely,

Sacramento Regional Coalition for Palestinian Rights

CalPERS Divest
C.R.E.W. Collective-Clothing. Resources. Education. Wellness.
Democratic Socialists of America, Sacramento Chapter

Gaza Ceasefire Christian Pilgrimage

Gaza Children are Not Numbers

Grandmothers for Peace

Healthcare Workers for Palestine, Sacramento

Japanese American Citizens League, Florin-Sacramento Valley Chapter

Jewish Voice for Peace, Sacramento Chapter

Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, Sacramento Chapter

Los Rios Community Colleges Faculty for Justice in Palestine