Donald Trump has announced that the United States will stop paying Israel $4 billion a year in military aid from the end of this year, in a dramatic break with decades of American policy.
Speaking to Fox and Friends on the morning of the US midterm elections, the president said he and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had “made a deal months ago that we’re stopping”.
“We were giving them $4 billion, we are, but it gets cut off at the end of the year,” he said. Asked whether that meant weapons or cash, Trump replied: “Any way you want to define it.”
Two years early
The current agreement, signed by Barack Obama in 2016, guarantees Israel $3.8 billion a year until 2028, most of it spent on American-made weapons. Trump said Netanyahu himself raised the idea of ending it early, and that Washington would still “help Israel if they need it”.
He also admitted politics played a part, complaining that “the left” had turned the payment into a symbol of unfairness. He singled out Abdul El-Sayed, the Michigan Democrat who could become America’s first Muslim senator and who campaigned against unconditional aid to Israel.
Blow for Netanyahu
Netanyahu’s office did not immediately respond. The Israeli leader had told an Israeli TV channel just days before last week’s election that the end of US aid was coming.
Netanyahu biographer Anshel Pfeffer described the abrupt announcement as a personal failure for Israel’s longest-serving leader and for Ron Dermer, the confidant who managed the relationship with the Trump White House.
Congress still has to pass spending bills every year to release the money, so lawmakers could yet have a say.
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