Aid To Israel Isn’t Foreign Aid; It’s An Investment By Yoram Ettinger
https://breakingdefense.com/2018/09/aid-to-israel-isnt-foreign-
Israel faces increasingly tight restrictions on its Foreign Military Financing from the U.S., as Breaking D readers know. In the past, when the US provided Israeli with grants under the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program, Israel could convert 25 percent of the aid from dollars into shekels to buy Israeli products and support local R&D. The new 10-year FMF agreement signed in 2017 decrees that that will gradually drop to zero. In this commentary, former minister for congressional affairs at Israel’s Embassy here, Yoram Ettinger, argues that America gets a great deal in return for the aid and assistance it provides Israel. Read on! The Editor.
Contrary to conventional wisdom, US-Israel relations have outgrown their one-way-street mode (the US gave and Israel received with much appreciation), evolving into a mutually-beneficial, two-way street mode, providing the US a well-deserved high-return on its annual $3.8 billion investment in Israel, conventionally defined as “foreign aid.” However, Israel, unlike all other recipients of foreign aid, is neither foreign, nor does it receive aid.
Yoram Ettinger
The US-Israel strategic compatibility is underlined by their national security orientation, allocating 3.6 percent and 4.7 percent of their budgets, respectively, to defense, much more than any European country: Britain 2.1 percent, France 1.8 percent, Germany 1.1 percent and Italy 1.1 percent, etc.
The scope of US-Israel strategic cooperation has surged since the 1991 demise of the USSR, which transformed the bi-polar globe into a multi-polar arena of conflicts, replete with highly unpredictable, less controllable and more dangerous local and regional threats. Israel’s experience and capabilities in facing such threats has provided the US a unique reinforcement in the face of three critical challenges, which impact the national and homeland security of the US: the megalomaniacal vision of Iran’s Ayatollahs; the clear and present threat of Islamic terrorism; and the need to bolster the pro-US Arab regimes, which are lethally threatened by the Shi’ite Ayatollahs and Sunni terrorist regimes.
In addition, the convergence of US-Israel strategic interests has been enhanced in response to the anti-US Arab tsunami (conventionally defined as the Arab Spring); the declining European posture of deterrence; the drastic cuts in the US defense budget; an increasingly unpredictable, dangerous globe; Israel’s surge of military and commercial capabilities; and the 400-year-old US-Israel shared Judeo-Christian values.
In July, 1950, in the aftermath of Israel’s War of Independence, Gen. Omar Bradley, first chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said: “The Israeli army would be the most effective force south of Turkey, which could be utilized for delaying action [extending the strategic hand of the USA]….” General Bradley’s assessment was rejected by the State Department and the Pentagon, which opposed the 1948 establishment of the Jewish State, contending that it would be decimated by the Arabs, a burden upon the US and probably an ally of the USSR.
In 2018, General Bradley’s assessments are vindicated, as the pro-US Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Oman, as well as Jordan and Egypt, seek further strategic ties with Israel. They view Israel as a most effective ally in the face of lethal threats posed by the anti-US ayatollahs, ISIS (Daesh) and Muslim Brotherhood terrorists, irrespective of the unresolved Palestinian issue – which they never considered a crown jewel – and their fundamental reservations about the existence of an “infidel” Jewish State in “the abode of Islam.”
In 2018, Russia lends credence to General Bradley recognizing Israel’s enhanced strategic posture, accepting Israel’s military operations against the rogue ayatollahs and Hezbollah terrorists in Syria, which has been a Moscow satellite since the late 1960s.
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