By Patricia Zengerle
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The top Democrat on the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee said on Tuesday he would not approve a massive arms transfer to Israel until he has more information about how Israel would use the weapons.
"I'm waiting for assurances," Representative Gregory Meeks told CNN. "... I want to make sure that I know the types of weapons and what the weapons would be utilized for," he said.
Reuters reported on April 1 that President Joe Biden's administration was weighing whether to go ahead with an $18 billion arms transfer package for Israel that would include dozens of Boeing (NYSE:BA) Co F-15 aircraft.
The news came as Biden faced pressure from foreign partners, human rights groups and some of his fellow Democrats in Congress to impose conditions on arms transfers to rein in Israel's offensive in Hamas-ruled Gaza.
Six months into Israel's air and ground campaign in Gaza, triggered by Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel, the devastated Palestinian enclave faces famine and widespread disease with nearly all its inhabitants now homeless.
U.S. law requires Congress to be notified of major foreign military sales agreements, and allows it to block such sales by passing a resolution of disapproval over human rights violations or other concerns, although no such resolution has ever passed and survived a presidential veto.
An informal review process allows the Democratic and Republican leaders of foreign affairs committees to vet such agreements before a formal notification to Congress, which means any of them can hold up an agreement for months or longer by asking for more information. Meeks is one of those four officials.
Meeks said there has been "enough of the indiscriminate bombing" in Israel's campaign in Gaza. "I don't want the kind of weapons that Israel has to be utilized to have more death. I want to make sure that humanitarian aid gets in. I don't want people starving to death and I want Hamas to release the hostages," Meeks said.
Meeks said he would decide whether or not he would approve the arms transfer after he had more information.
Israel is seeking to beef up its already formidable fleet of warplanes not just for its continuing fight against Hamas but to ward off any further threat from the Tehran-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah on its northern border as well as from Iran, its regional arch-foe.