The House Armed Services Committee blocked an amendment that sought to strip a relatively routine provision on U.S.-Israel cooperation out of the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act by a bipartisan voice vote.

Leaders of the committee on both sides of the aisle spoke out against the amendment, led by Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), saying that critics of the provision — who have claimed it would fuse the U.S. and Israeli militaries or subvert U.S. sovereignty — were misrepresenting the legislation.

The provision, Section 224 of the bill, builds upon existing U.S.-Israel cooperative programs in developing and acquiring defense technologies and requires the Pentagon to designate a single official to oversee all U.S.-Israel cooperative programs.

Khanna said, in introducing the amendment, that the “American people are tired of the arrogance and insolence of Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu telling America what we should do,” and described the amendment as a handout of additional U.S. support for Israel. He suggested that it would undermine U.S. sovereignty.

He also claimed, falsely, that Netanyahu had written to the sponsors of the NDAA provision praising them for it and framing it as his initiative and a way to subvert congressional oversight and approval.

Despite misrepresentations online, Netanyahu’s letter pertained to a separate piece of legislation endorsing his call to wind down U.S. aid to Israel, though both touch on the idea of expanding U.S.-Israel cooperative programs and co-development.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle pushed back.

Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), the Armed Services Committee ranking member, said he is “very sympathetic” to Khanna’s “frustration … with Netanyahu’s leadership in Israel” but said that “the way this amendment was described is simply not accurate.” And he emphasized that the vote was not a referendum on the U.S.-Israel relationship broadly.

“This is not a new framework,” Smith said, noting that the U.S. already has three existing cooperative programs with Israel to develop new technologies, and that the provision does not create any new programs. “To say that this is us bowing to the bidding of Israel on this is completely inaccurate. The reason we’re doing this is because we benefit from that technology development.”

He explained that the reason such partnerships exist with Israel is because Israel has developed battle-tested and -proven systems that the U.S. can benefit from.

“Taking a step back from using technology that is available to us just because we strongly disagree with where Israel is at right now, I think would be a mistake,” Smith said.

Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL), the Armed Services Committee chair, emphasized that the provision does not create any new programs but instead improves oversight by designating a single official to be responsible for existing U.S.-Israel cooperative programs.

“Claims that this provision somehow cedes authority to a foreign government are simply ridiculous,” Rogers continued.

Reps. Ronny Jackson (R-TX), Don Davis (D-NC), Don Bacon (R-NE), Joe Wilson (R-SC), Jared Golden (D-ME) and Austin Scott (R-GA) also spoke against the amendment, offering similar arguments. Jackson and Davis were the lead sponsors of the FUTURES Act, on which the provision was modeled.

Jackson and Davis both emphasized that they had not received any communication from Netanyahu about the provision in question, and noted that it builds on an effort that has been established over multiple recent NDAAs.

Jackson noted that the legislation even requires public reporting on the cooperative efforts, including how they benefit the U.S. “Those saying Sec. 224 is a military merger removing U.S. sovereign command simply have not read or do not understand this provision,” Jackson said.

Davis said that the amendment would not stop the existing collaboration between the U.S. and Israel, but would “hinder our ability to cooperate more efficiently” against bad actors globally.

Golden argued, “Opponents of Sec. 224 are really allowing a broader political disagreement and these concerns about Israel … to override a program that fundamentally advances U.S. national security.” 

He emphasized that the provision doesn’t reduce U.S. oversight, provide Israel with access to U.S. data, give Israel control over U.S. defense programs or production, create a backdoor for military aid or “fuse” the U.S. military with Israel’s, referencing various arguments made against the program.

Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-CA) was the only member to join Khanna in supporting the amendment, claiming it would “institutionalize and expand U.S. military integration beyond anything in the history of the relationship, fusing our defense industries across research production and emerging technologies,” claiming that the effort contravenes U.S. arms sales laws, though no sales are involved in the provision under discussion.

She also suggested that the Israeli government was a cybersecurity threat to the U.S., pointing to the U.S. sanctions on the private Israeli spyware firm NSO Group.

AIPAC opposed the Khanna amendment, while J Street and a range of progressive groups supported it. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) has said he would introduce an amendment on the House floor to remove the provision if the Armed Services Committee failed to do so.

The committee rejected, by a 26-30 vote, an amendment by Rep. Pat Ryan (D-NY) to block any further funding for operations in or against Iran, except in defense of the U.S. or its allies and partners from imminent attack. Davis was the only Democrat to cross party lines to oppose the amendment.

“It would prohibit the president and secretary of defense from using my constituents’, our constituents’ tax dollars to continue waging this ill-conceived and unconstitutional war in Iran,” Ryan said, describing the amendment as consistent with the House war powers vote to halt the Iran war.

Rogers said that “this incredibly reckless amendment would prohibit our military from defending our service members and our allies against [Iranian] attacks.”

An amendment by Rep. Wesley Bell (D-MO) to instruct the Pentagon to institute a department-wide policy prohibiting the display of hate symbols and setting uniform standards to identify, address and review hate symbols was adopted by a voice vote.

“The department currently relies on a patchwork of service-specific policies governing tattoos, symbols, and workplace displays,” Bell said. “As a result, standards vary across the military, creating inconsistencies, and how hate symbols are identified, addressed, and enforced. That lack of uniformity creates unnecessary gaps and uncertainty where there should be clarity.”

Bell and other Democrats framed the policy as a response to the Coast Guard’s moves last year to reclassify displays of swastikas as “potentially divisive” rather than inherently banned hate symbols.

“The swastika is not politically divisive. It is one of the most universally recognized symbols of hatred in human history,” Bell said. “It represents racial supremacy, it represents antisemitism, violent extremism and the systemic persecution and murder of millions.”

The Anti-Defamation League praised Bell and the committee for passing the amendment.

An amendment by Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA), which Moulton said sought a full accounting from the Pentagon of the costs of U.S. military operations against Iran, failed in a party-line vote. 

However, the text of Moulton’s amendment, as shared by the committee, included language calling for a diplomatic solution to the war in Iran and describing it as a “unilateral war of choice initiated by the president” without support from Congress, the American people or U.S. allies.

A separate amendment by Moulton, which conformed more closely to his description — requesting a report on the total cost of military operations in Iran including replacement value of equipment damaged or destroyed, the cost of munitions used, the costs for repairing or rebuilding damaged military facilities — was approved without incident as part of a bipartisan package of amendments.

As part of another bipartisan amendment package, the committee approved an amendment by Rep. Pat Harrigan (R-NC) would establish a U.S.-Abraham Accords Defense Cooperation Initiative, to improve cooperation between the U.S. and Abraham Accords countries, with a focus on air and missile defenses, missile development, intelligence, reconnaissance, planning special operations force development and joint military exercises.

The effort is aimed at deterring Iran and its proxies.

As part of that same amendment package, the committee added a request for the administration to provide Congress with a refreshed strategy for integrated air and missile defense with Middle East partners, which Congress first requested in a previous NDAA.

In another amendment package, the committee approved an amendment that would withhold 75% percent of U.S. funding for the Iraqi security forces until the Pentagon certifies that the Iraqi government has taken “credible steps” to reduce the influence and power of Iranian-aligned militia groups within the Iraqi security forces.

The committee also approved, as part of amendment packages, provisions requiring the Defense Department to report to or brief Congress on opportunities to expand defense partnerships in the Eastern Mediterranean to combat Hezbollah and other Iranian proxies, biosecurity risks from Iran, Russian influence and bases in Syria, the civilian harm investigation into the U.S. strike on a girls’ school in Minab, Iran, the Iranian drone attack that killed six U.S. service members in Kuwait on March 1 and the feasibility of using current authorities to support the professionalization of Syrian security forces.

The committee approved the amended NDAA by a 44-12 vote — an unusually large number of Democratic “No” votes on a generally bipartisan bill. Democrats had sought cuts to the overall topline funding proposal for the Pentagon in 2027, which Republicans rejected.

Republicans also successfully incorporated a provision to formally rename the Department of Defense as the Department of War, as the Trump administration has done informally.