Looney anti-Israel conspiracy theorists find fresh fodder in US defense bill

Congress has been known to slip indefensible special-interest provisions into large must-pass bills when no one is looking. What it has never done before is use such sleight of hand to hand over control of the US military to a foreign country, but that’s what we’re told is on the verge of happening on Capitol Hill.The House just passed the National Defense Authorization Act, a sprawling $1.15 trillion bill that supposedly includes a provision buried in it “merging” the US and Israeli militaries. This provision, known as Section 219, has united some of the most fervent anti-Israel conspiracy theorists on the right and the left in denouncing the alleged betrayal of America, from Marjorie Taylor Greene to  AOC, from Tucker Carlson to Cenk Uyghur. AOC has warned that the provision “is an existential threat to American sovereignty and democracy.”Marjorie Taylor Greene has said anyone who voted for the bill “sold out the American people to a foreign country.”Tucker Carlson wants literal treason trials. So, what is the substance of Section 219? Legislation often has obfuscatory titles but this provision is deemed, with admirable clarity, The United States-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative. It calls for the secretary of Defense to designate “an executive agent” to coordinate between the US and Israel on “bilateral defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, integration, and industrial cooperation.”The Pentagon will come up with a plan for such cooperation and report back to Congress.That’s it.There is nothing about merging the general staffs of the US military and the IDF; nothing about creating a joint office where Pete Hegseth and his Israeli counterpart, Israel Katz, work together; nothing about giving Bibi Netanyahu partial control of CENTCOM.That the United States would want a close working relationship with Israel on military technology is hardly surprising.Israel is one of the world’s most innovati...