US Approves Iron Dome Funding for Israel after Heated Congressional Debate
The U.S. House of Representatives has approved a new round of funding for Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system, ending weeks of heated political sparring on Capitol Hill.
The measure, which allocates $1.3 billion in emergency defense assistance, passed late Friday with bipartisan support, though not without fierce opposition from progressive lawmakers.
The funding comes at a time of renewed conflict in the region and amid mounting criticism from human rights groups over Israel's ongoing military operations in Gaza. Supporters of the bill argued that the Iron Dome, designed to intercept short-range rockets and missiles, is a purely defensive system vital to protecting civilian lives.
'This funding is about saving lives — full stop,' said Representative Michael McCaul (R-TX), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. 'Our ally Israel has the right to defend itself from indiscriminate rocket attacks.'
Despite bipartisan backing, the vote exposed deep divisions within the Democratic Party. A bloc of progressive Democrats, including Representatives Rashida Tlaib and Cori Bush, vocally opposed the measure, arguing that unconditional military support to Israel undermines the pursuit of peace and justice for Palestinians.
'We cannot continue to rubber-stamp billions in weapons for a government accused of committing war crimes,' said Rep. Tlaib on the House floor. 'This is not a neutral act — it is complicity.'
While the measure ultimately passed with a vote of 317 to 108, nearly 70 Democrats joined Republicans in supporting the bill, a figure that underscores the enduring political strength of the U.S.-Israel alliance, even amid growing public debate.
Critics, however, view the decision as part of a long-standing U.S. policy of military favoritism that exacerbates regional instability.
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Egypt Independent
an hour ago
- Egypt Independent
‘Nothing has changed': Iran tries to rearm proxy groups as US talks stall
CNN — Iran's armed proxies are ramping up pressure on key points in the Middle East as Tehran attempts to rebuild its regional influence, eroded by almost two years of a destructive Israeli military campaign. Tehran's Houthi allies in Yemen ended months of calm in the Red Sea last week with strikes on two commercial ships travelling in the critical waterway. Proxies in Iraq are suspected of disrupting oil production in the Kurdish region, and shipments of hundreds of rockets bound for Hezbollah in Lebanon have been intercepted by Syrian forces over the past months. The increasing activity by the proxies reflects Iran's determination to continue supporting a network of disruptive armed groups – long seen as essential to Tehran's deterrence strategy, despite their failure to deter recent Israeli and American attacks on Iranian soil – ahead of possible talks with Washington to reach a new nuclear deal. But so far, neither the United States nor Iran appears to be willing to make major compromises. 'Iran was never going to stop resupplying their groups,' said Michael Knights, a senior fellow at The Washington Institute specializing in the military and security affairs of Iraq, Iran and the Gulf states. 'They might not be able to send this much or regularly – more stuff might get intercepted – but if you're the (Iranian) Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force right now, what you're trying to show is 'we still exist, we're intact, nothing has changed.'' Israel launched an unprecedented attack on Iran last month, targeting and killing key military figures, including the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Hossein Salami, critical to sustaining and expanding the Islamic Republic's regional proxy network, and Behnam Shahriyari, who Israel says was responsible for weapons transfers to Tehran's proxies. But even as Iran reels from the loss of key military figures, it has persisted in arming those proxies, signaling that it still views them as a strategic asset to expand its regional leverage. Smoke rises in north Tehran on June 23, 2025. Elyas/AFP/Getty Images Yemen Just three days after a ceasefire was declared between Iran and Israel, a vessel carrying 750 tons of Iranian missiles and military equipment, including missiles, drone engines and radar systems, was intercepted in the Red Sea by forces loyal to Yemen's exiled government, the United States Central Command said Wednesday. It added that the 'massive Iranian weapons shipment' was destined for the Houthis. The interception, according to the US military, marked the 'largest weapons seizure' in the history of the Yemeni National Resistance Forces (NRF) – a pro-US, anti-Houthi group led by Tariq Saleh, the nephew of Yemen's late leader Ali Abdullah Saleh. The Iranian foreign ministry denied that it had sent weapons and called it a 'deceitful attempt' by the US to 'divert public opinion.' The Houthis in Yemen have used Iranian weaponry to launch attacks on both Israel and commercial vessels in the Red Sea. An attack on a Greek-owned ship last week killed four crew members, injured others and left 11 people missing, the European Union naval operation Aspides told CNN. Six of those on board were captured by the Houthis, a UK-based maritime risk management company, Vanguard Tech, told CNN. A screen grab taken from a handout video released on July 8, showing plumes of smoke rising from what is said to be Liberia-flagged, Greek-operated bulk carrier, the MV Magic Seas that was attacked off southwest Yemen. Houthi Media Center/Reuters Days before that, the Houthis targeted a Liberian-flagged bulk carrier, the Magic Seas, using unmanned boats, missiles and drones. The attacks, which sank the two vessels, appear to show an escalation of force and were the first recorded this year after months of calm in the busy waterway. Iraq Over the past few months, suspected Iran-backed groups have also increased their attacks on Western allies in Iraq, destabilizing oil output in the Kurdish-controlled region of the country. Five oil fields, including two operated by US companies, were hit after a 'spate of drone attacks' by 'criminal militias,' Aziz Ahmad, an official in the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG), said on Wednesday. 'The KRG welcomed U.S. investment and companies. Now, those same investors are being pushed out in a calculated campaign to economically strangle us,' Ahmad said on X. Smoke billows from a damaged oil installation at the Sarsang oil field following a drone attack on the Chamanke district near the Kurdish city of Dohuk in northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region on July 16. Safin Hamid/AFP/Getty Images The spokesperson for the KRG Peshawa Hawramani told CNN that the drone attacks are 'intended to destroy the energy infrastructure' and to ensure that the KRG 'has no capacity to produce oil and gas, so it cannot use this as leverage in agreements or rely on it as a source of income.' The KRG's interior ministry blamed attacks earlier this month on the Popular Mobilization Units, a predominantly Shiite Iranian-backed paramilitary force based in Iraq. 'These attacks are being carried out… with the aim of creating chaos,' the interior ministry said after a bomb-laden drone landed near the KRG capital Erbil earlier this month. Lebanon Iran's regional influence has been substantially weakened since Hamas' October 7, 2023 attack on Israel and Israel's subsequent campaign to root out Tehran's proxies from the region. Iran's key ally in Lebanon, Hezbollah, sought to support Hamas after October 7 by firing cross-border rockets and opening a second front against Israel. Since then, the group has been severely weakened, losing its once-dominant influence in Lebanon and facing growing internal and Western demands to disarm, as its fighters are targeted by near-daily Israeli strikes. The group's revered leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli strike last year and its key supply route in Syria was lost after the fall in December of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a crucial ally to Tehran. A person holds up a picture of late Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in Israeli airstrikes last year, on the day of a public funeral ceremony in Beirut, Lebanon, on February 23. Mohammed Yassin/Reuters 'Hezbollah are losing sway, they've lost credibility with their own base. Of course, the Iranians are trying to reinforce some of their proxies to reinforce their negotiating hand, but they're not making much headway,' a regional official told CNN. Still, another regional source told CNN that Hezbollah could begin 'regrouping itself over the coming weeks' fearing an escalation from Israel. Hezbollah feels it is in an 'existential situation' because of the loss of Syria and the growing internal Lebanese pressure, the source added. Syria Iran's attempts to rearm Hezbollah have continued over the past year. The new Syrian government, which staunchly opposes Iran, has seized several shipments of weapons bound for Lebanon, according to the Syrian Interior Ministry. Last month, the Syrian interior ministry said in a statement that it had foiled an attempt to smuggle anti-tank Kornet missiles, the same type used by Hezbollah to target Israeli tanks in southern Lebanon. The Syrian police said the weapons were hidden in a truck carrying vegetables in the Homs countryside, which borders Lebanon. The first regional source who spoke to CNN questioned Tehran's purpose in arming proxy groups who had proven ineffective in protecting Iran, or achieving their stated mission of 'liberating Jerusalem.' 'Why are Hezbollah still arming? What have their arms given them? It has not given them protection, it has not brought them an inch closer to Jerusalem? What are these arms doing except causing misery to a civilian population?' the source said. Asked if Damascus was seeing Iranian attempts to arm Hezbollah, one senior Syrian government official told CNN, 'We're intercepting Iranian shipments quite often. Mostly seems to be collected locally and put together in small shipments to be smuggled to Lebanon.' 'We're also seeing clear activities to send money to networks in Syria through Iraq,' he added. A solider with Syria's ministry of defense forces at a house which Hezbollah and Iranian backed militia had used as a weapon storage in Palmyra, Syria, in March 2025. Salwan Georges/TheTrump in 'no rush' to talk Iran's rearming of groups across the Middle East comes as US President Donald Trump signals his waning interest in negotiations with Tehran. 'They want to negotiate badly. We're in no rush… we bombed the hell out of their various places, if they want to negotiate, we are here,' Trump said Wednesday. Ali Larijani, a senior adviser to Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, dismissed the idea that talks were imminent and downplayed their importance. 'Right now is not the time for talks. Negotiations are a tactic… we wait and see if the Supreme Leader finds it useful or not,' Larijani said in a televised statement on Friday. A sixth round of negotiations was scheduled June 15, but Israel's surprise attack the day prior disrupted the plans. Experts say rebuilding regional armed groups and showcasing their disruptive capabilities could serve as leverage for Iran, as it looks to negotiate from a position of strength despite its recent losses. 'It will strengthen their hand, in theory, to show that they are not just rolling over and subservient… they want to appear defiant but not enough that the US hits them,' Knights said.
Al-Ahram Weekly
an hour ago
- Al-Ahram Weekly
'No life without water': settler attacks threaten West Bank communities - War on Gaza
From his monitoring station on a remote hill in the occupied West Bank, water operator Subhil Olayan keeps watch over a lifeline for Palestinians, the Ein Samiyah spring. So when Israeli settlers recently attacked the system of wells, pumps and pipelines he oversees, he knew the stakes. "There is no life without water, of course", he said, following the attack which temporarily cut off the water supply to nearby villages. The spring, which feeds the pumping station, is the main or backup water source for some 110,000 people, according to the Palestinian company that manages it -- making it one of the most vital in the West Bank, where water is in chronic short supply. The attack is one of several recent incidents in which settlers have been accused of damaging, diverting or seizing control of Palestinian water sources. "The settlers came and the first thing they did was break the pipeline. And when the pipeline is broken, we automatically have to stop pumping" water to nearby villages, some of which exclusively rely on the Ein Samiyah spring. "The water just goes into the dirt, into the ground," Olayan told AFP, adding that workers immediately fixed the damage to resume water supply. Just two days after the latest attack, Israeli settlers -- some of them armed -- splashed in pools just below the spring, while Olayan monitored water pressure and cameras from a distance. His software showed normal pressure in the pipes pulling water from the wells and the large pipe carrying water up the hill to his village of Kafr Malik. But he said maintenance teams dared not venture down to the pumping station out of fear for their safety. Since the start of the war in Gaza, deadly settler attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank have become commonplace. Last week, settlers beat a 20-year-old dual US citizen to death in the nearby village of Sinjil, prompting US ambassador Mike Huckabee to urge Israel to "aggressively investigate" the killing. Annexation Issa Qassis, chairman on the board of the Jerusalem Water Undertaking, which manages the Ein Samiyah spring, said he viewed the attacks as a tool for Israeli land grabs and annexation. "When you restrict water supply in certain areas, people simply move where water is available", he told AFP at a press conference. "So in a plan to move people to other lands, water is the best and fastest way", he said. Since the start of the war on Gaza, several Israeli politicians and officials have become increasingly vocal in support of annexing the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967. Most prominent among them is Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, himself a settler, who said in November that 2025 would be the year Israel applies its sovereignty over the Palestinian territory. Qassis accused Israel's government of supporting settler attacks such as the one on Ein Samiyah. The damage to Ein Samiyah's water facilities was not an isolated incident. In recent months, settlers in the nearby Jordan Valley took control of the Al-Auja spring by diverting its water from upstream, said Farhan Ghawanmeh, a representative of the Ras Ein Al Auja community. He said two other springs in the area had also recently been taken over. Water rights In Dura al-Qaraa, another West Bank village that uses the Ein Samiyah spring as a back-up water source, residents are also concerned about increasingly long droughts and the way Israel regulates their water rights. "For years now, no one has been planting because the water levels have decreased," said Rafeaa Qasim, a member of the village council, citing lower rainfall causing the land to be "basically abandoned". Qasim said that though water shortages in the village have existed for 30 years, residents' hands are tied in the face of this challenge. "We have no options; digging a well is not allowed", despite the presence of local water springs, he said, pointing to a well project that the UN and World Bank rejected due to Israeli law prohibiting drilling in the area. The lands chosen for drilling sit in the West Bank's Area C, which covers more than 60 percent of the territory and is under full Israeli control. Israeli NGO B'Tselem reported in 2023 that the legal system led to sharp disparities in water access within the West Bank between Palestinians and Israelis. Whereas nearly all residents of Israel and Israeli settlements have running water every day, only 36 percent of West Bank Palestinians do, the report said. In Dura al-Qaraa, Qasim fears for the future. "Each year, the water decreases and the crisis grows -- it's not getting better, it's getting worse." Follow us on: Facebook Instagram Whatsapp Short link:
See - Sada Elbalad
an hour ago
- See - Sada Elbalad
Iran's FM: No Conviction Yet to Resume Nuclear Talks with U.S.
Ahmed Emam Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi stated on Saturday that Tehran remains unconvinced of the utility of resuming negotiations with Washington, citing the need for 'a genuine will from the other side aimed at reaching a mutually beneficial solution.' In an interview with China's CGTN, Araghchi emphasized that the recent escalation was not a mere conflict but 'a blatant act of aggression by Israel against the Islamic Republic of Iran.' He said Iran had no choice but to defend itself, and that its response had forced the attackers to retreat and seek an unconditional ceasefire. 'We stood our ground bravely and compelled the aggressors to step back and request a ceasefire — which we accepted,' Araghchi said. 'However, this ceasefire remains fragile. Given the track record of this \[Israeli] entity, we cannot trust it. We remain fully prepared for any possible violations.' Araghchi reiterated that Iran did not initiate the war and does not wish for it to continue. 'We were prepared for it, and we remain ready in case it reignites — although we do not seek its prolongation,' he said. Addressing the future of the nuclear deal, the foreign minister stressed that Iran is still waiting to witness seriousness from its counterparts. 'We are fully confident that our nuclear program is entirely peaceful, and we are open to sharing this certainty — but that can only happen through negotiations.' Referring to the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) reached with the P5+1 group, Araghchi noted it was widely welcomed internationally, but the United States' unilateral withdrawal from the agreement derailed its progress. 'That unfortunate decision has led directly to the current situation,' he remarked. When asked about the possibility of returning to the nuclear accord, Araghchi responded: 'Yes, I believe it is possible. But, as I said, it depends on a real will from the other side. The military option must be ruled out, and the path forward must be through diplomatic solutions.' He concluded by stressing that the recent attack on Iranian nuclear facilities proved that military approaches are ineffective. 'There is no solution but a negotiated diplomatic one — and that will only materialize if the other side abandons military ambitions and begins to make amends for the damage done. Only then will Iran be ready to return to the negotiating table.' read more Gold prices rise, 21 Karat at EGP 3685 NATO's Role in Israeli-Palestinian Conflict US Expresses 'Strong Opposition' to New Turkish Military Operation in Syria Shoukry Meets Director-General of FAO Lavrov: confrontation bet. nuclear powers must be avoided News Iran Summons French Ambassador over Foreign Minister Remarks News Aboul Gheit Condemns Israeli Escalation in West Bank News Greek PM: Athens Plays Key Role in Improving Energy Security in Region News One Person Injured in Explosion at Ukrainian Embassy in Madrid News Israeli-Linked Hadassah Clinic in Moscow Treats Wounded Iranian IRGC Fighters News China Launches Largest Ever Aircraft Carrier Sports Former Al Zamalek Player Ibrahim Shika Passes away after Long Battle with Cancer Arts & Culture "Jurassic World Rebirth" Gets Streaming Date Videos & Features Tragedy Overshadows MC Alger Championship Celebration: One Fan Dead, 11 Injured After Stadium Fall Lifestyle Get to Know 2025 Eid Al Adha Prayer Times in Egypt Arts & Culture South Korean Actress Kang Seo-ha Dies at 31 after Cancer Battle News "Tensions Escalate: Iran Probes Allegations of Indian Tech Collaboration with Israeli Intelligence" Sports Get to Know 2025 WWE Evolution Results News Flights suspended at Port Sudan Airport after Drone Attacks
