By Ben Finley
President Donald Trump says the U.S. will stop providing $4 billion in aid each year to Israel in 2027 but will sell arms to its closest ally in the Middle East.
The Republican president told Fox News Channel during a phone call on Tuesday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had approached him about the idea and that they have been talking about it for a couple years.
Trump says Israel doesn’t need the aid and it’s a lot of money for the U.S. to spend. But Trump also says that U.S. aid to Israel has become a Democratic talking point for candidates such as Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed.
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“You can consider it barter. You can consider military aid or cash,” Trump said. “Look, we give them $4 billion of things and money, and they don’t need it. And I was approached by Bibi Netanyahu, and we’ve been talking about it for a couple of years because it’s a lot of money.”
There was no immediate comment from Netanyahu’s office.
The United States has sent tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Israel over the last few years.
An academic study published last year showed the U.S. under the administrations of President Joe Biden, a Democrat, and Trump provided at least $21.7 billion in military assistance to Israel after the start of the Gaza war in 2023. The study was published on the second anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks in Israel that provoked the conflict.
Another study, also published last year by the Costs of War project at Brown University’s Watson School of International and Public Affairs, said the U.S. had spent roughly $10 billion more on security aid and operations in the broader Middle East in the previous two years.
While the reports relied on open source material for most of their findings, they offered some of the most comprehensive accountings of U.S. military aid to close ally Israel and estimated costs of direct American military involvement in the Middle East.
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