Ending US Aid May Strengthen US-Israel Alliance

The financial subsidy has long been the most visible element of the relationship. It has never been the most important.

President Trump’s announcement that the United States intends to end annual military grants to Israel has raised concerns about a deterioration in the relationship between the two countries. Coming amid an unpopular war with Iran, declining American public support for Israel, and Democratic victories in both houses of Congress, the announcement appears to mark the beginning of a more uncertain era. Yet the conventional interpretation may have it backward. The end of American military grants could ultimately strengthen the US–Israel alliance, not despite Israel’s growing independence but partly because of it. It could encourage both countries to cultivate a relationship more explicitly grounded in mutual strategic interests.

The Subsidy Obscures Israel’s Strategic Value

Israel possesses advanced military and intelligence capabilities, a sophisticated defense sector, and extensive experience confronting adversaries that also threaten American interests. The countries cooperate in missile defense, cybersecurity, counterterrorism, intelligence sharing, and military research and development. These are not merely ancillary benefits of a relationship sustained by American financial assistance. They constitute independent reasons for Washington to value Israeli cooperation, particularly in a region where American policymakers have repeatedly confronted the limits, costs, and political consequences of direct military intervention.

Consider Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system, initially developed in Israel and thereafter supported through substantial American funding and co-production. The system illustrates how Israeli innovation and American industrial capacity can produce benefits for both countries: American companies manufacture significant portions of its interceptors, and the US Army has itself acquired Israeli-developed batteries. Another instructive example is Israel’s 2007 destruction of Syria’s clandestine nuclear reactor at Al Kibar. Israeli intelligence alerted Washington, but the Bush administration declined military action. Israel then destroyed the reactor itself, advancing a nonproliferation objective shared by both countries without requiring the involvement of American forces. The circumstances of these episodes differ, but both illustrate the same proposition: Israeli capabilities can advance American interests through technological cooperation, independent military action, or a combination of the two.

Why Ending Aid Could Strengthen the Alliance

The argument for ending assistance is not simply that Israel can increasingly afford to finance its own defense, nor that the removal of a subsidy itself automatically yields a stronger partnership. The point is that financial independence could change the political incentives, institutional attitudes, and strategic expectations through which the two countries sustain their cooperation.

First, ending direct grants would remove the most visible and politically vulnerable feature of the relationship. A relationship organized increasingly around joint research, co-production, intelligence cooperation, and technologies that directly benefit American forces would be more defensible on its strategic merits than one whose public image is defined principally by a recurring appropriation. An alliance tied more to enhanced American military capabilities invites a different view of national interest than one perceived as benefiting Israel more than the US.

Second, financial independence would alter the incentives of both governments. Israel would have additional reasons to demonstrate its value as a strategic partner through technological innovation, military cooperation, and contributions to shared security objectives. Meanwhile, Washington could no longer regard financial assistance as a principal tool for securing Israeli cooperation; it would need to cultivate that cooperation via strategic arrangements explicitly beneficial to both countries. Such arrangements would not eliminate disagreements, but they could create deeper institutional and industrial interests in preserving cooperation, making the relationship less dependent on the political fortunes of any particular administration.

These developments do not guarantee a stronger alliance, and none should be confused with the idea that Israel’s autonomy necessarily increases its strategic value. A more independent Israel could make decisions that Washington opposes, just as an Israel receiving assistance has sometimes done. The more defensible conclusion is that removing financial dependence could encourage both countries to organize their relationship around the strategic value each already provides, while developing new forms of cooperation that reinforce that value over time.

The Larger Geopolitical Contest

The importance of this transition becomes clearer against the broader international landscape. The alignment of China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea to counter American hegemony presents overlapping challenges to American strategic interests. North Korean troops and military supplies have supported Russia’s war in Ukraine; Russia has incorporated Iranian-designed drone technology into its military operations; China remains Iran’s primary petroleum purchaser, and Russian support and satellite imagery supplied by Chinese groups have reportedly improved Iranian targeting. This growing collaboration allows threats in one region to reinforce those in another, creating greater challenges to American interests and increasing the strategic importance of capable, dependable allies. Few American allies have demonstrated Israel’s combination of military capability, technological sophistication, and willingness to confront common adversaries in the 21st century. Israel’s growing financial independence does not itself increase its strategic value to the US, but it does change the nature of the relationship: both countries would need to cultivate cooperation on the basis of reciprocal strategic interests rather than financial dependence.

For an America increasingly concerned with strategic competition in the Pacific, a militarily capable Israel that finances its own defense may be especially valuable. It can contribute to regional deterrence, intelligence collection, and the containment of common threats without requiring the US to shoulder every burden itself, freeing American resources for strategic priorities in other theaters. The strategic argument for cooperation thus rests not on the assumption of permanent agreement between the two governments, but on the expectation that sufficiently important national interests will continue to overlap in ways that materially benefit both countries.

Independence Also Creates Risks

The strongest objection to this argument is that greater Israeli autonomy also enables greater divergence from American interests. The ongoing war with Iran illustrates the problem. Israeli military operations can advance shared objectives against a common adversary, but they can also expose Washington to consequences that the US may not wish to assume. An Israel that finances its own weapons may feel freer to deploy them independently, while the United States remains exposed to the diplomatic, political, and military consequences of that deployment. Yet financial independence does not eliminate Israel’s dependence on American arms, logistical support, intelligence, or potentially direct military assistance. This interdependence, notwithstanding the substantial disparity in the two countries’ respective power and resources, places the relationship precisely where it ought to be: on a foundation of mutual strategic interests, with each country recognizing that continued cooperation requires due regard for the interests of the other.

Declining American public support presents another substantial risk. A Pew Research Center survey earlier this year found that 60 percent of Americans viewed Israel unfavorably, with particularly negative attitudes among Democrats and younger Americans. Congressional opposition to arms sales has also increased. These developments cannot be dismissed as temporary political noise, because public opinion influences elections, appropriations, weapons-export decisions, and the willingness of future administrations to maintain strategic ties. Nor would ending financial assistance resolve American disagreements with Israeli policies concerning Gaza, the Palestinians, settlements, or military operations against Iran. The political legitimacy of the relationship must therefore be earned through a persuasive account of its continuing benefits, not assumed from historical ties or shared democratic traditions.

There is an important distinction between making an alliance more popular and making it more defensible on its strategic merits. The latter is achievable even when the former is uncertain. A relationship that demonstrates concrete benefits to American security has a stronger substantive basis for weathering political vicissitudes than one whose most visible feature is a multibillion-dollar subsidy. Strategic interests do not operate independently of politics, but they can provide a reasoned basis for sustaining cooperation when public sentiment is unsettled or divided.

The Revelation of True Alliance

For decades, the most visible question surrounding the US–Israel relationship has been how much America gives Israel. That question has overshadowed a more consequential inquiry: what strategic value does each country provide the other, and how can that value be sustained as their respective capabilities and interests evolve? The answer has never depended solely on American financial assistance. Nevertheless, as Israel becomes more capable of financing its own defense, the two countries have an opportunity to construct a partnership whose legitimacy rests increasingly on shared strategic interests, demonstrable reciprocal benefits, and the mutual recognition that cooperation must be cultivated rather than presumed.

The end of American aid could strengthen the US–Israel alliance, not weaken it. By removing the financial dependency that has so often defined its public image, it could reveal and ultimately reinforce the strategic interdependence that has always been its more enduring foundation.