Armed Conflict Foreign Relations & International Law

The Lawfare Podcast: U.S. Arms Transfers to Israel, with Brian Finucane and Josh Paul

Tyler McBrien, Brian Finucane, Josh Paul, Jen Patja
Tuesday, November 28, 2023, 8:00 AM
What is the domestic and international law that governs U.S. arms transfers?

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Last month, following Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel, President Biden announced that his administration would ask Congress for “an unprecedented support package for Israel’s defense,” totaling $14.3 billion. Such a package would supplement the defense aid Israel already receives from the U.S. According to Jonathan Guyer in Vox, “Israel has received about $3 billion annually, adjusted for inflation, for the last 50 years, and is the largest historical recipient of US security aid.” 

But with civilian casualties in Gaza mounting, including the reported killing of thousands of Palestinian children, likely with weapons of U.S. origin, a recent article in Foreign Affairs by Brian Finucane asks, “Is Washington Responsible for What Israel Does With American Weapons?” 

To talk through that essay, Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien sat down with Brian, a Senior Adviser at the International Crisis Group and former attorney adviser in the Office of the Legal Adviser at the U.S. State Department, as well as Josh Paul, a former Director in the State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, which oversees U.S. arms transfers, who resigned in protest over the U.S. government’s provision of weapons to Israel for use in the conflict in Gaza. They discussed the scale and process of U.S. weapons transfers, the domestic and international law that govern these transfers, and whether the U.S. is complicit and liable for war crimes committed with its weaponry. They also discussed why it would be a mistake to rely solely on the law of war to bring an end to the death and destruction in Gaza.


Tyler McBrien is the managing editor of Lawfare. He previously worked as an editor with the Council on Foreign Relations and a Princeton in Africa Fellow with Equal Education in South Africa, and holds an MA in international relations from the University of Chicago.
Brian Finucane is a Senior Adviser for the U.S. Program at the International Crisis Group. He focuses on developing policies and institutional checks to decrease U.S. reliance on military tools in foreign affairs, including through legislative reforms of war powers and counterterrorism authorities.
Josh Paul is the former director in the State Department’s political-military affairs bureau, which oversees U.S. arms transfers.
Jen Patja is the editor and producer of the Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security. She currently serves as the Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics, a nonprofit organization that empowers the next generation of leaders in Virginia by promoting constitutional literacy, critical thinking, and civic engagement. She is the former Deputy Director of the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier and has been a freelance editor for over 20 years.

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