Washington DC - Senator Chris Van Hollen, widely considered a potential challenger to Chuck Schumer for Senate majority leader, is leading a fight to prevent deeper integration between the US and Israel's militaries.

In a letter sent to congressional leaders from both parties, Van Hollen led a group of 12 Senate Democrats to demand the scrapping of a plan to more closely integrate the US' and Israel's militaries.

The group warned that further integration and funding of Israel's military would not only threaten US national security interests, but make Washington even more complicit in the internationally-recognized genocide in Gaza.

Specifically, the senators objected to three provisions within the Fiscal Year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), two of which would establish a "United States-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative."

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The initiative would see the US and Israel work together of defense technology research as well as the development, testing, and evaluation of military systems.

"Should these provisions be enacted, it would further increase Israel's leverage over the United States through some of the most sensitive technologies in warfare. That is not in the US interest," the letter read.

"If enacted, these agreements would create long-term dependencies by embedding Israeli technology into the US defense industrial base that could make future policy changes costly or difficult to implement."

Van Hollen is widely considered a potential replacement for Senator Chuck Schumer as the Democrats' leader in the Senate. Schumer is increasingly unpopular among voters, particularly due to his stalwart support of Israel. He did not sign the letter.

Congressman Ro Khanna also hit out against the NDAA provisions, declaring on X that he is "outraged" by the idea of integrating the US military with Israel's.

"This needs to be top priority in the lame duck," Khanna declared. "I am pushing every Democrat and our leadership to get Section 219 out of our defense bill."