(Radio Iowa) – Iowa Senator Joni Ernst says the U-S must maintain its ironclad commitment to Israel as it faces a possible attack from Iran.  “Because Israel took out a terrorist leader in Tehran — right in Iran, then the Iranians feel like they need to do something to exact retribution equal to what the Israelis did,” Ernst says. A Hamas leader attending an event in Iran was killed last week. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied responsibility. Six days ago, an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon killed a senior commander of Hezbollah, a terrorist group backed by Iran.

Ernst, a Republican from Red Oak, is a member of the U-S Senate Armed Services Committee. She says if Iran or Hezbollah send missiles toward Israel, the U-S must be prepared to support counter measures. “As we saw in April with the United States and a number of our Arab friends in conjunction with Israel, we were able to defend from those rocket attacks,” Ernst says, “but what we don’t want to see is a wider scale war in the Middle East.”

Ernst and nearly all the other Republicans in the U-S Senate, including Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley, signed a letter Friday that calls on the Biden Administration to ensure all congressionally-approved ammunition and weapons systems are delivered to Israel. The G-O-P senators accused Biden of imposing a partial arms embargo on Israel.

A State Department spokesman says the U-S has delayed a shipment of 35-hundred bombs out of concern the bombs would be used in densely populated urban areas, but nothing else has been stopped or paused.