The House of Representatives Building and the East Portico of the US Capitol. Photo: Flickr.
Over the last year, much of the political rancor involving the US-Israel relationship was focused on the presidential race. Yet historiographical evidence reveals that Congress plays an extremely important role in the US-Israel relationship.
In 1981, an intense lobbying effort on the part of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) helped convince the Reagan administration to abandon an $8.5 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia that included five Airborne Warning and Control Systems (AWACS) planes. As a result, the House voted to block the sale by a vote of 301-111, and while the Senate eventually approved the transaction, their approval only came after increased assurances on the part of the Reagan administration that Israel’s security would not be compromised.