Election Ploy or Strategy Shift: Why Trump Announced an End to Military Aid to Israel

In an interview with Fox News on Tuesday (3 November), while the US midterm elections were underway, Trump said he had reached an agreement with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to end the funding. He added that the US would continue selling weapons to its Middle Eastern ally and would stand by it if needed.

On the surface the announcement is highly significant, especially coming from a president as staunch in his support for Israel as Trump. However, Trump gave no details on how the aid would be wound down. Moreover, the existing US-Israel military aid agreement runs until September 2028.

Trump made the remark against the backdrop of declining American support for Israel since the Gaza war, particularly among Democrats. According to a Quinnipiac University poll, 48 percent of voters and 66 percent of Democrats believe the US is giving Israel too much support. When the question was first asked in 2017, the figures were only 16 and 20 percent respectively.

In Trump's view, the aid to Israel has become a "political tool of criticism" for Democrats. He specifically named Abdul El-Sayed, the newly elected Democratic senator from Michigan, who made history as the first Muslim member of the US Senate.

"When they don't even need this money, why should we suffer because of the words of a 'lunatic' like El-Sayed?" Trump asked. He also argued that Israel is wealthy enough to manage without American funding.

The issue has also become contentious within Trump's own political movement.

The announcement on election day was therefore driven by domestic political calculation. The main aim was to stop Democrats from using the issue to attack Republicans. Trump claimed Netanyahu himself proposed ending the aid. However, the Israeli prime minister had earlier discussed phasing the aid down gradually over the next decade rather than stopping it abruptly.

After the midterms, both chambers of the US Congress are now under Democratic control. That will make passing any new aid for Israel quite difficult in any case.

Since its founding, Israel has received more US military and civilian assistance than any other country in the world, and it continues to do so.

The foundation of this arrangement is a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in 2016 under President Barack Obama.

Under that MoU, Israel is promised a total of $38 billion in military aid over the 10 years from fiscal 2019 to 2028. Each year, $3.3 billion is provided as Foreign Military Financing (FMF) and $500 million for joint missile defense programs, totaling $3.8 billion a year.

Additional assistance beyond this framework has also been provided, especially after the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October 2023 and the start of the Gaza war.

Importantly, this is not cash aid. Under FMF, Israel uses the US money to buy American-made military equipment and to obtain services and training. As a result, US defense contractors are also direct beneficiaries of the arrangement.

Netanyahu himself has acknowledged that US aid cannot be taken as permanent. In an interview with The Economist last January, he said he wants to reduce Israel's dependence on US military assistance over the coming decade. Because the aid comes with strings attached, he has to depend on the opinions of American lawmakers. He said this vulnerability would become even more pronounced if he returned to power and continued attacking Gaza.

An abrupt end to the aid, however, would be an entirely different situation. Following Trump's announcement, Israeli opposition leaders have already begun sharply criticizing Netanyahu.

Gadi Eisenkot, a former army chief and Netanyahu's main political rival, wrote on X after Trump's remarks: "Israel's special relationship with the United States is one of the main pillars of our national security. Israel's security establishment and its people are learning of a change in the framework of the strategic relationship through the media. This shows how much of a real threat Netanyahu's conduct poses. He can no longer be relied upon. He must be removed."

Yair Golan, leader of Israel's Democrats party, issued a similar warning. He wrote: "At a time when Israel's defense spending has skyrocketed, when the country's stockpile of offensive weapons needs to be rebuilt, and when its air defenses have been weakened by a prolonged war, Netanyahu has added yet another enormous failure to his record. The end of US aid is a severe blow to Israel's security and to people's standard of living..."

Trump's remark thus came at a very uncomfortable time for Netanyahu, as he is desperately negotiating to assemble the number of seats needed to form the next government. His closeness to Trump had been one of the biggest strengths of his politics.

The news outlet Ynet quoted an unnamed senior Israeli official who said the announcement would have a severe impact on the economy. "Giving up two years of aid means losing $8 billion. Where will we get this money? It's clear that the aid will have to come out of citizens' taxes," the official said.

Aid cannot be ended with a single announcement, because the existing MoU runs until 2028 and the power to allocate these funds each year rests with the US Congress.

The most likely outcome may be a negotiated reduction in direct aid, with the alternative being to seek deeper mutual cooperation in defense technology and weapons manufacturing. Discussions on the future framework of US-Israel security cooperation have already begun. However, the matter has also raised concern within the US itself, since one section of the US administration believes it would be far from a good outcome if Israel were to acquire the technology to build larger and more advanced bombs on its own.