Reporting and Opinion By Mathew Carr*

Israel has already used integrated technology — including AI-assisted targeting systems like Lavender — in Gaza in murderous ways that generated enormous controversy after surging deaths.

Now, US lawmakers are wanting to deploy a nefarious “section 224” in “must-pass” defence law that would combine the nation’s military with Israel’s defence supply chains, including AI, hacking and directed-energy weapons.

If those kinds of systems become jointly developed and classified under a US-Israel framework, American public discourse about them becomes legally constrained.

Concern about crypto and hacking is also valid.

Joint systems create joint vulnerabilities, and those vulnerabilities become reasons to classify more information, further shrinking the space for public debate.

So, the First Amendment concern re the US constitution isn’t just about AIPAC money chilling congressional speech — it’s that Section 224 potentially builds a structural architecture where the subject matter itself becomes legally off-limits for public discussion.

That is an attack on democracy and “people power” as President Donald Trump continues to cover up Epstein files and weaponise the DoJ on his critics.

That’s a much more concrete and durable threat to free expression than lobbying pressure alone.

It is already happening with most mainstream press simply failing to report hardly anything to do with section 224.

This includes New York Times, Financial Times, Bloomberg (unless I’ve missed it).

(More to come)

 

Free speech is

under attack

 

Notes:

Me: Thanks. But just on the first amendment bit there, I mean, isn’t it true that incorporating AI into this security apparatus really means that a lot of the public narrative can be suppressed because of security concerns, crypto concerns, hacking concerns? And so the first amendment concern is actually big. Right?

*Claude partly checked, be aware:

That’s a sharp observation and yes, it’s actually a more serious First Amendment concern than the indirect one I mentioned.

The argument would run something like this:

Classification creep

Once Section 224 creates a joint US-Israel executive agent overseeing integrated technology development, vast amounts of information about what the US military is actually doing with Israel becomes classifiable as national security material.

That’s a legitimate [CarrZee: illegitimate?] suppression mechanism — journalists, activists, and even members of Congress can be blocked from discussing or disclosing it.

AI and algorithmic systems specifically

If the integrated technologies include AI-driven surveillance, targeting, or information systems — which given Israel’s well-documented AI military technology is highly likely — those systems could be deployed in ways that are entirely shielded from public scrutiny behind classification walls. The public can’t debate what it can’t see.

Israel’s existing precedent

This is important context. Israel has already used integrated technology — including AI-assisted targeting systems like Lavender — in Gaza in ways that generated enormous controversy.

If those kinds of systems become jointly developed and classified under a US-Israel framework, American public discourse about them becomes legally constrained.

The cybersecurity/hacking angle

Your point about crypto and hacking concerns is also valid. Joint systems create joint vulnerabilities, and those vulnerabilities become reasons to classify more information, further shrinking the space for public debate.

The net effect

So the First Amendment concern isn’t just about AIPAC money chilling congressional speech — it’s that Section 224 potentially builds a structural architecture where the subject matter itself becomes legally off-limits for public discussion. That’s a much more concrete and durable threat to free expression than lobbying pressure alone.

It’s arguably the kind of provision the Church Committee reforms of the 1970s were designed to prevent — secret executive-foreign power entanglements that operate entirely outside democratic accountability.

Rushed, secret fusing of weapons making, AI, intelligence sharing makes U.S. directly complicit in the actions of Israel as it illegally killed perhaps 100,000 in Gaza (2)