Senate votes to end aid for Yemen fight over Khashoggi Killing and Saudis’ war aims

The Senate voted Thursday to end US military assistance for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen in the strongest show of bipartisan defiance against President Donald Trump’s defence of the kingdom over the killing of a dissident journalist.

The 56-41 vote was a rare move by the Senate to limit presidential war powers and sent a message of disapproval for a nearly four-year conflict that has killed thousands of civilians and brought famine to Yemen. Moments later, senators unanimously approved a separate resolution to hold Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia personally responsible for the death of the journalist, Jamal Khashoggi.

Together, the votes were an extraordinary break with Trump, who has refused to condemn the prince and dismissed US intelligence agencies’ conclusions that the heir to the Saudi throne directed the grisly killing.

People on Oct 23, 2018, walk past the ruins of buildings destroyed in airstrikes on the Old City of Sanaa, Yemen. The US Senate voted on Dec 13, 2018, to withdraw American military support to Saudi Arabia after the kingdom’s crown prince was accused of ordering the murder of a dissident journalist. The New York Times

While the House will not take up the measure by the end of the year, the day’s votes signal that Congress will take on Trump’s support of Saudi Arabia when Democrats take control of the House next month.

“What the Khashoggi event did, I think, was to focus on the fact that we have been led into this civil war in Yemen, half a world away, into a conflict in which few Americans that I know can articulate what American national security interest is at stake,” said Sen Mike Lee, R-Utah. “And we’ve done so, following the lead of the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.”

The resolution was written by Lee and Sen. Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont. It was an unusual invocation of the War Powers Act, a 1973 law by which Congress sought at the end of the Vietnam War to reassert its constitutional role in deciding when the United States would go to war.

Seven Republican senators joined Democrats to pass the resolution: Lee, Susan Collins of Maine, Steve Daines of Montana, Jeff Flake of Arizona, Jerry Moran of Kansas, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Todd Young of Indiana.

Trump has maintained steadfast support for Saudi Arabia and Crown Prince Mohammed, even though the CIA has concluded that he ordered the assassination of Khashoggi inside its consulate in Istanbul in October.

© 2018 New York Times News Service