The Future of U.S./Israel Relations: Two Elections, Two Scenarios -Part I
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”
The Elections That Changed Everything
We are now past two fateful elections, both of which carry great meaning for Israel’s future: the Israeli elections, which by a wide margin rejected the October 7 government led by Netanyahu, and the American elections, which rejected virtually everything that marks the Trump administration.
The main motivators of the two voting populations could not be further apart. In the U.S., there is endless talk and publicity about many issues, but as James Carville famously said, “It’s the economy, stupid!” Looking back at most major American elections over the last 50 years, the driving force for most of the voting base has been their wallets.
In Israel, by contrast, as much as people’s pockets may be hurting, economic concerns have almost never been the main force driving the vote.
When current President Yitzhak Herzog headed the Labor Party, he pursued a campaign based on the economy and the socio-economic devastation that the then-Netanyahu government had brought down on the weakest sections of society. Netanyahu was well aware of the damage he had done by increasing the number of people below the poverty line and hitting the pockets of the middle class, so he did what Netanyahu always does. Facing a strong challenge from Herzog’s socio-economic campaign, he shifted heavily toward existential and defense issues, branding himself “Mr. Security.” His campaign focused on the claim that if the opposition won, Israel would cease to exist, and that only he could protect the future existence of the State. His main arguments were:
– Opposition to a Palestinian State: In a significant last-minute shift to rally his right-wing base, Netanyahu stated explicitly on the final day of the campaign that if re-elected, a Palestinian state would not be established, effectively walking back his 2009 Bar-Ilan speech supporting a two-state solution. He firmly opposed dividing Jerusalem or making territorial withdrawals.
– Countering Iran: His chief foreign policy focus was preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. He emphasized the Iranian threat globally, most notably by traveling to Washington two weeks before the election to deliver a controversial speech to a joint session of the U.S. Congress opposing the Obama administration’s nuclear deal.
When push came to shove, Netanyahu’s fear mongering made people think: if Israel didn’t exist, what difference would Herzog’s socio-economic platform matter to anyone? Fear won out over bettering society. This was neither the first nor the last time Netanyahu used his trinity of political survival, division, fear, and hate, to win votes.
In this election, it didn’t work, despite Netanyahu’s desperation. He went so far as to say in an interview on Channel 14 (a channel that exists explicitly to support Netanyahu, Israel’s equivalent of Fox News) that sanctions on Israel would reach epic proportions, that we would be cut off from the world banking system, and that Israel would need to become a crypto-based financial society. This caused an uproar throughout Israel’s financial world as well as backlash from within Likud.
Two days later, determined to sow fear that Iran would drop a nuclear bomb on Israel if he were not prime minister, he posted an AI image of a nuclear explosion over Tel Aviv. Netanyahu’s worst desperate attempt, however, was a plan to indefinitely postpone the elections by launching a major military operation against Iran. Fortunately, our chief of staff prevented it and demanded written cabinet approval of the operation. Since the attack was not coming from the cabinet but was solely a Netanyahu-planned operation for political purposes, no written approval was forthcoming.
He had a backup plan: together with his loyal Mossad chief, he planned some kind of attack that would provoke Iran and trigger a major operation. According to news reports, a senior military official “made a mistake” and information about the major military attack leaked to the Americans. Trump stopped both operations posthaste. All pre-election polls showed a defeat for Netanyahu’s bloc, and he desperately tried either to turn things around or to prevent the elections from taking place.
The influence of the Israeli elections on the U.S. is minimal, yet Israel played a large role in the Republicans’ losses. The vote was a very strong statement against the war with Iran, which many, perhaps most, Americans rightly blame Israel for dragging Trump into. This blame extends to the high cost of gas, which impacts every American, and to the hundreds of billions of dollars the war has cost the American taxpayer. It was further exacerbated by the American government’s financial aid and weapons supply in support of Israel’s war in Gaza, which has gone on far too long, with far too much destruction and the creation of the world’s largest humanitarian refugee crisis: two million people left homeless and living in horrendous conditions. And it is known that Netanyahu himself is the person preventing the advancement of Trump’s 19-point plan for Gaza’s rehabilitation.
The massive amounts of money poured into the well-oiled machines set up years before by Iran, Qatar, and others, and set in motion on October 7 to turn Israel from victim to aggressor, succeeded big time. It turned Americans, and even young American Jews, against Israel on a scale never before seen in American-Israeli relations. As a result, the number of anti-Israel candidates elected to Congress portends a major shift in the future of our relations. And no one should believe this is happening only among progressive-left Democrats; the shift has already begun to take hold among Republicans as well.
Until Netanyahu’s efforts to divide the U.S. Congress, support for Israel had always been a non-question, bipartisan issue. Netanyahu’s actions over the years showed a blatant preference for and deference to Republican presidents and Republicans in general. The most glaring example was his address to Congress defaming the Obama/Kerry Iran nuclear deal, followed by his convincing Trump, in his first administration, to withdraw from the deal entirely. Those actions were the true forerunners of Iran’s shift in its nuclear program and of the war against Iran.
Conversely, the U.S. elections will have a major impact on Israel. Over the last three years, a combination of the government’s actions and the billions of dollars invested by Iran, Qatar, and others in the aforementioned well-oiled anti-Israel machine contributed to the greatest backlash against Israel in its history. It reached large portions of the American population and has changed the American political map, environment, and support for Israel, probably forever. A change of government in Israel and a complete change of policies and plans will set in motion the rebuilding of the relationship, but it can never be the same and will take years to repair.
Abdul El-Sayed, the new senator from Michigan, is a strong example of the changing winds in Washington. He is extremely dynamic, well educated, and well spoken, with great ideas for America. He has a long history of growing up with Jews and Jewish friends. He does not seem to be an antisemite, but he is definitely anti-Israel. He claims he is against the actions of the Israeli government, especially regarding the devastation of Gaza, which has been fully supported monetarily and militarily by the U.S. administration, and the pulling of Trump into the Iran war. He specifically points to AIPAC as “the” major influencer and source of corruption in the U.S. government and among politicians. That statement is very powerful and harmful.
Personally, I am not a fan of AIPAC. Its blind support for all the actions of the Israeli government is morally wrong. That support has become blind support for Netanyahu, who has unfortunately become the face of Israel, something he worked hard to promote for years. J Street, on the other hand, is a very strong supporter of the State of Israel but not of the government’s actions. AIPAC’s money and support for politicians who are completely pro-Israel have helped bring about a 180-degree shift, and anti-Israel politicians and the public now see it as the poison that has infected American politics. This shift is growing in Congress, in the voting public, and lately in the U.S. administration, as seen in comments by the Vice President and, in recent days, by Trump as well.
I have long said that Trump holds grudges forever. Due to circumstances he sees as beneficial to him, he may delay acting on them. He has shown great support for Netanyahu. However, he holds multiple grudges against him. The major ones are:
– Netanyahu convinced Trump to leave the Iran nuclear agreement, promising that the Iranians would come begging on all fours for a deal politically better for Trump. That obviously didn’t happen, and the anger is there.
– Netanyahu called to congratulate Joe Biden on winning the presidential election, whereas Trump to this day denies the election results.
– Netanyahu convinced Trump to go to war together against Iran, promising they would overthrow the Ayatollahs’ regime within three weeks. Trump overruled all of the military leadership and experts in favor of buying Netanyahu’s half-baked, non-data-driven presentation to convince him to go to war.
– Netanyahu is actively blocking the advancement of Trump’s 19-point plan for Gaza.
– The support Trump has shown Netanyahu has taken a major toll on his political base, and Trump always needs to blame others for his losses. Netanyahu will likely be a front-runner for that blame.
The changing tides of support for Israel, together with Netanyahu’s actions and words, are already causing changes that will begin to impact Israel in the very near future. Netanyahu, without the knowledge of the security establishment, closed a deal with Trump that the $4 billion in annual military grants to Israel will end. It is still not known exactly when. The current aid agreement, signed by Obama, was to end in 2028. In the past, discussions and negotiations for renewing grant agreements typically go into high gear two years before the previous agreement expires. Trump’s announcement threw the defense establishment into a tailspin, as the continuing grants were planned into future budgets and major purchases such as F-35 jets and fighter helicopters.
This, too, is a distinct and worrying portent for the future of U.S. grants, military research and development, arms sales and supplies, and the list goes on. Anyone who in the past claimed or imagined Israel to be an island of military independence had those imaginings blasted away during this ongoing multi-front war. The constant supply of missiles, ammunition, bombs, air-defense weaponry, and more from the U.S. was crucial to our fighting on all fronts. Beyond that is how our enemies see us: if they see our supply lines drying up, we are again at risk and seen as vulnerable.
Two elections, Israeli and American, have reshaped the political landscape. Netanyahu’s fear-based campaign failed domestically, while in the U.S., backlash over the Iran war, Gaza, and his alignment with Republicans produced historic erosion of bipartisan support. Personal grudges between Trump and Netanyahu, combined with the quiet cancellation of military grants, signal that the ground beneath the relationship is shifting, before any new government is even formed.