US and International Law Require
Ending All Arms Shipments to Israel
Institute for Middle East Understanding

Momentum towards blocking weapons to Israel continues to build at an unprecedented rate through increasing support for Joint Resolutions of Disapproval (JRDs) in the Senate and Block the Bombs in the House. While shifts from Members of Congress and advocacy organizations towards blocking US taxpayer-funded weapons to Israel is a welcome development, it is not enough.

Israel’s violations of the Foreign Assistance Act and Arms Export Control Act, as well as US obligations under international law–the Genocide Convention, the Geneva Conventions, and the Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts–require the US to end all weapons to Israel.

BACKGROUND
The 119th Congress (2025-2026) has witnessed an unprecedented level of congressional momentum toward blocking the delivery of deadly weapons to Israel.

On April 15, 2026, 40 Senators voted for Joint Resolutions of Disapproval (JRDs) to block nearly $500 million in 1,000-pound bombs and/or Caterpillar D9 bulldozers from being delivered to Israel–a record-breaking number of Senators voting for JRDs to block weapons to Israel.

And the historic Block the Bombs Act (H.R.3565), a bill which would proactively prevent President Trump and future administrations from sending more bombs and other weapons to Israel, now has an impressive 66 sponsors as of this writing.

In recent weeks, several Members of Congress have also staked out new positions opposing any US taxpayer-funded weapons to Israel, arguing that Israel–as a wealthy country–can pay for its own weapons. In addition, some advocacy organizations have adopted similar positions and have also urged that any weapons deliveries to Israel comply with US law.

These are positive developments. Ending all forms of US taxpayer-funded weapons to Israel is a step in the right direction and would lessen the degree of our direct complicity in Israel’s atrocities. However, merely ending US taxpayer-funded weapons to Israel is not enough.

To comply with existing US laws and US obligations under international law, the US must impose a comprehensive arms embargo on Israel as it inflicts ongoing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, and commits war crimes and crimes against humanity through the forcible displacement of millions of Lebanese and Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, and through the deliberate targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure in Palestine, Lebanon, and Iran.

DETAILS
Here are five US domestic laws and US obligations under international law that mandate an end to all giveaways or sales of US weapons to Israel in response to its atrocities:

1. Section 502B of the Foreign Assistance Act (FAA)
   (22 U.S.C. § 2304) stipulates that “no security assistance may be provided to any country the government of which engages in a consistent pattern of gross violations of internationally recognized human rights.”

Gross violations of human rights (GVHR), as defined by the FAA, “includes torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment, prolonged detention without charges and trial, causing the disappearance of persons by the abduction and clandestine detention of those persons, and other flagrant denial of the right to life, liberty, or the security of person.”

The Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, in its report Welcome to Hell: The Israeli Prison System as a Network of Torture Camps, concluded that “Facilities in which every inmate is deliberately subjected to harsh, relentless pain and suffering operate as de-facto torture camps.” Since October 2023, B’Tselem has recorded that 84 Palestinians have died in Israeli detention, in many cases because of “systematic abuse, including physical and psychological violence, inhuman conditions, deliberate starvation and denial of medical treatment”. B’Tselem also noted that as of December 2025, Israel held 3,329 Palestinians in “administrative detention,” which can be a prolonged period of detention without charge or trial.

In January 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued provisional measures in a case brought by South Africa against Israel under the Genocide Convention requiring Israel to “take all measures within its power to prevent the commission of all acts within the scope of Article II of this Convention, in particular: (a) killing members of the group; (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; and (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group.”

Israel’s systemic torture of Palestinian prisoners, its ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, and its disregard of the ICJ’s provisional measures clearly place Israel in violation of this provision of the FAA.

It is important to note that the definition of “security assistance” in the FAA is not limited to US taxpayer-funded expenditures through Foreign Military Financing (FMF), Economic Support Funds (ESF), International Military Education and Training (IMET), peacekeeping operations, and antiterrorism assistance.

In addition, the prohibition on “security assistance” also extends to the “sales of defense articles or services, extensions of credits (including participations in credits), and guaranties of loans under the Arms Export Control Act” and “any license in effect with respect to the export to or for the armed forces, police, intelligence, or other internal security forces”.

In other words, countries violating the FAA are ineligible to receive any weapons from the US regardless of whether they are provided at taxpayer expense or sold.

2. The Arms Export Control Act (AECA) (22 U.S.C. §2754)
   stipulates that “Defense articles and defense services shall be sold or leased by the United States Government under this chapter to friendly countries solely for internal security, for legitimate self-defense, for preventing or hindering the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and of the means of delivering such weapons, to permit the recipient country to participate in regional or collective arrangements or measures consistent with the Charter of the United Nations, or otherwise to permit the recipient country to participate in collective measures requested by the United Nations for the purpose of maintaining or restoring international peace and security, or for the purpose of enabling foreign military forces in less developed friendly countries to construct public works and to engage in other activities helpful to the economic and social development of such friendly countries.”Israel’s usage of US weapons to maintain an illegal military occupation of Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), and to commit potential war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, and Iran clearly constitute unacceptable usage of US weapons under the AECA. Because US weapons are being used systematically by Israel in ways which are illegal under the AECA, the US should not be providing any weapons to Israel, including through selling or leasing weapons, according to this law.
4. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
   The US voted for Genocide Convention in 1948 and became a signatory in 1988 after passing domestic legislation defining genocide as a federal crime. As a party to the Genocide Convention, the US is obligated under international law to prevent and punish genocide.  In its 2007 judgement in the Case Concerning Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro), the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that states which are parties to the Genocide Convention are obligated “to employ all means reasonably available to them, so as to prevent genocide so far as possible.
5. A State does not incur responsibility simply because the desired result is not achieved; responsibility is however incurred if the State manifestly failed to take all measures to prevent genocide which were within its power, and which might have contributed to preventing the genocide.” (Paragraph 430)Not only has the ICJ ruled that states must “employ all means” to prevent genocide, including but not limited to ending the delivery of weapons to countries committing genocide. In addition, the ongoing provision of US weapons to Israel places the US in violation of the Genocide Convention as well. Article III(E) of the Genocide Convention makes “complicity” in genocide punishable. In the same case cited above, the ICJ also ruled that “there is no doubt that ‘complicity’, in the sense of Article III, paragraph (e), of the Convention, includes the provision of means to enable or facilitate the commission of the crime” (Paragraph 419).

   In other words, to comply with its international legal obligations under the Genocide Convention, and to end its complicity in genocide, the US must immediately all end weapons transfers to Israel.

   For additional details, please see US Legally Obligated to Prevent, Punish Israel’s Genocide of Palestinians in Gaza | IMEU Policy Project Policy Memo #23.

6. Common Article 1 of the 1949 Geneva Conventions.
   The US is a party to all four Geneva Conventions of 1949. Common Article 1 of the conventions states: “The High Contracting Parties undertake to respect and to ensure respect for the present Convention in all circumstances.”

2. 
   In a 2016 commentary, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)–the mandated custodian of the Geneva Conventions–determined that the duty “to ensure respect” under Common Article 1 “comprises both a negative and a positive obligation. Under the negative obligation, High Contracting Parties may neither encourage, nor aid or assist in violations of the Conventions by Parties to a conflict. Under the positive obligation, they must do everything reasonably in their power to prevent and bring such violations to an end.” (Paragraph 154)In addition, the commentary noted that “Common Article 1 requires High Contracting Parties to refrain from transferring weapons if there is an expectation, based on facts or knowledge of past patterns, that such weapons would beused to violate the Conventions.” (Paragraph 162)

   And in a fact sheet specifically dealing with weapons transfers, the ICRC also notes that “by virtue of their obligation to respect and ensure respect for IHL in all circumstances (Article 1 common to the four 1949 Geneva Conventions), all States are prohibited from transferring weapons to a party to an armed conflict, whether a State or non-state armed group, where there is a clear risk that this would contribute to the commission of IHL violations.”

   Therefore, under both the negative and positive obligations under Common Article 1, the US must end all weapons transfers to Israel so as not to “aid or assist” in Israel’s violation of international humanitarian law (IHL) and to prevent and end these violations.

3. Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts.
   These articles codified customary international law on state responsibility and were adopted by the International Law Commission of the United Nations in 2001. In general, customary international law is binding on all states.Article 16 establishes that “A State which aids or assists another State in the commission of an internationally wrongful act by the latter is internationally responsible for doing so” when “that State does so with knowledge of the circumstances of the internationally wrongful act”.

In addition to this general prohibition on aiding or assisting another state in a wrongful act, Article 41(1) mandates that states must “cooperate to bring to an end through lawful means any serious breach” of international law, which is defined in Article 40 as a “gross or systematic failure” to fulfill its obligations under peremptory norms of international law. Article 41(2) also mandates that no state shall “render aid or assistance” to another state to maintain a serious breach of international law, which is defined in Article 40 as a “gross or systematic failure” to fulfill its obligations under peremptory norms of international law.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) drew upon this article when it issued an advisory opinion on Legal Consequences Arising from the Policies and Practices of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Including East Jerusalem in July 2024. In this opinion, the ICJ considered Israel’s continued presence in Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) to be illegal because, through its policies and practices, it has violated the prohibition of the acquisition of territory by force and violated the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination. Israel is therefore under an obligation to end its presence in OPT “as rapidly as possible.”

Addressing the obligations of other states, the ICJ concluded that they are “under an obligation not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by Israel’s illegal presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” (Paragraph 279)

As US weapons are used extensively by Israel to maintain and entrench its illegal presence in OPT, the US is under an international legal obligation to prohibit weapons to Israel.