President Donald Trump should not forego the military aid leverage needed to bring Israel in line with US foreign policy.

When Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Mar-a-Lago on December 29 for a meeting with President Donald Trump, he likely discussed the possibility of a 20-year military aid pledge from the United States. This would potentially take effect when the commitment, known as the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), expires in 2028. President Donald Trump should not forego the leverage needed to bring Israel in line with US foreign policy.

The public and Congress should vigorously press the administration to say no to an extended MOU. Given its conduct of the past two years, Israel should not be receiving any military aid from the United States, much less a 20-year pledge. A new, long-term military aid agreement would basically be an endorsement of Israel’s criminal conduct in Gaza and its ongoing aggression in the West Bank and the wider region.

Few Americans know that our government is in the midst of a 10-year agreement that commits the United States to provide at least $3.8 billion in weapons to Israel each year. No other nation has such an arrangement with the United States.

The $3.8 billion figure is a floor, not a ceiling, as evidenced by the first year of Israel’s war on Gaza, when the Biden administration provided a record $17.9 billion in military aid to Jerusalem. 

The flood of US taxpayer-funded weaponry to Israel since the start of the genocide in Gaza in October 2023 has enabled Israel to commit what many independent experts believe is a genocide in Gaza. The human toll is devastating. Direct military action by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has killed over 67,000 Palestinian civilians and combatants in Gaza and wounded 169,000 more. There have also been untold numbers of indirect deaths from starvation, disease, and lack of basic medical services. 

None of the above could have happened without US military aid. Israel’s entire inventory of combat aircraft consists of US-supplied F-15s, F-16s, and F-35s, and the United States has provided tens of thousands of bombs and missiles to Israel since the start of its attacks on Gaza. The Biden or Trump administrations could have stopped the slaughter at any time by cutting off aid, maintenance, and spare parts for the Israeli military machine. Instead, both administrations chose to scold Jerusalem rather than take concrete action to rein in its behavior.

Some have assumed that the worst of the killing is over now that President Trump’s plan for Gaza took hold. But the Trump deal is a ceasefire in name only, as Israeli actions continue to kill Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank on a routine basis.

Congress could step in and block aid at any point during the proposed 20-year agreement, but making a promise of two decades’ worth of aid would further handicap the United States should it make a genuine effort to rein in Israel’s aggression in Gaza and throughout the region.

If past practice is followed, the terms of the new MOU will be determined behind closed doors, with little or no input from Congress or the public. This agreement cannot and should not stand in the light of day. Not only is the repression of the Palestinians continuing at a rapid clip, but Israel’s military adventurism, like its air strikes on Iran, could draw the United States into yet another Middle East war.

Before the administration commits tens of billions of our tax dollars to a country that is committing genocide in parts of Palestine under its brutal military rule and attacking other nations in the region, it should suspend military aid to Israel as leverage to force it to end its violation of the ceasefire for Gaza, as well as to persuade Jerusalem to rein in its relentless military attacks, both on Palestinians and on neighboring states.

Congress and the public should press for an end to America’s military blank check for Israel by blocking any long-term agreement and suspending current weapons support as leverage to press for an end to Israel’s indiscriminate killing of Palestinians. It’s well past time to end business as usual in US military relations with Israel. 

About the Author: William D. Hartung

William D. Hartung is a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. He was previously the director of the Arms and Security Program at the Center for International Policy and the co-director of the Center’s Sustainable Defense Task Force. Bill is the co-author, with Ben Freeman, of The Trillion Dollar War Machine: How Runaway Military Spending Drives America into Foreign Wars and Bankrupts Us at Home.

Image: US Air Force / Shutterstock.com.

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