On the morning of Tuesday’s election, Donald Trump made a big announcement on a phone call with Fox News.
The President claimed that the U.S. government would stop sending Israel military aid at the end of the year.
“They’re fine with it because they’ve become a very successful country,” Trump said. “They don’t need it. And we won’t be paying anymore.”
There are caveats here, as with most of Trump’s statements. Israeli officials seemed completely shocked by the declaration, and Congress has already appropriated billions in weapons through 2028.
However, Trump’s overall plan is not surprising, as the Israel Lobby and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have spent months pushing for a new arrangement. In fact, an end to military aid was one of the last issues that Lindsey Graham advocated for before his death.
The logic from the pro-Israel camp is pretty straightforward.
Most Americans now have a negative view of Israel, and they don’t like the fact that their tax dollars are used to buy the country’s weapons. The choice to sell Israel weapons, as opposed to just gifting them, also allows lawmakers to frame the recalibration as a win for U.S. workers.
In his remarks to Fox, Trump acknowledged that the move was partially PR-related, citing the criticisms that Israel has faced from people like Abdul El-Sayed, who was elected Michigan’s next Senator this week.
“Why should we suffer the slings from lunatics like El-Sayed when they don’t need it?” Trump asked. “It’s a bad talking point.”
The next part of this plan is a deeper integration between the U.S. and Israeli militaries, which is why the issue is being pushed in the next National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).
“This integration of the U.S. and Israeli defense industrial bases would expose our most sensitive technologies to a country – and an industry – with a track record of industrial espionage, and would give Israel leverage over U.S. foreign and defense policy through making us reliant on their supply chain,” Josh Paul, a former State Department and co-founder of the political action committee A New Policy, told Mondoweiss earlier this year.
Meanwhile, Israel still gets weapons and is allowed to kill Palestinians with them, but the country gets to “stand on its own two feet” and use its own money to finance the violence. All that progressive talk about “conditioning aid” to the country based on its human rights record can go out the window, as there will be nothing to condition.
The impact of this looming reality transcends the rest of Trump’s lame duck presidency. Democratic presidential hopefuls like Gavin Newsom and Rahm Emanuel have openly embraced “cutting off” military aid, while rejecting policies that would actually have an impact, like an arms embargo.
Tuesday’s Blue Wave occurred in no small part because of Trump’s criminal war on Iran, which is vastly unpopular among the American people. According to NBC News exit polling, 74% of voters said the war was a “crucial” or “major” factor in their vote.
Voters have repeatedly indicated that they want U.S. foreign policy to move in a different direction, and it’s unclear whether they’ll be fooled by Trump’s latest bait-and-switch. If the President’s recent comments were a last-minute attempt to bolster GOP support in the election, they certainly saw through that one.
Providence divests from Israel
Providence, Rhode Island, has become the largest city in the United States to divest from Israel.
Question 7 didn’t mention Israel by name, but it requires the state’s capital to “divest from countries and companies profiting from genocide, apartheid, ethnic cleansing and prolonged military occupation,” as determined by U.N. experts and other international authorities.
The outgoing Mayor, Brett Smiley, is a centrist Democrat who publicly opposed the measure, claiming that an economic boycott of Israel would somehow threaten Jewish people.
“It will make many members of our community unsafe because we know antisemitism is on the rise in the country and here in Rhode Island,” claimed Smiley. “And something targeting Israel will, in effect, target our Jewish community here in Providence.”
Incoming Mayor David Morales, who defeated Smiley in the August primary, is a democratic socialist who supported the measure.
“It’s an initiative that I support because I believe it’s important that we have levels of moral clarity across every level of government, especially at the local level,” he recently explained. “It’s important to be able to set an example, not just for the rest of Rhode Island, but for the rest of the country, as it relates to the types of investments that are being made using our local taxpayer dollars.”
On Tuesday night, the coalition that organized around the measure, Providence for Palestine, put out a statement celebrating the news.
“This historic victory is a testament: people across this country demand an end to US support for Israel’s genocide and apartheid, and Palestinian liberation is our compass,” it read.
“Let this victory be an inspiration to our movement across the country and around the world: you don’t need to wait for any politician or party’s permission to fight for Palestine, all you need is the power of the people!,” it continued. “Now and forever — FREE PALESTINE!”
Odds & Ends
- Mondoweiss: Haley Stevens is trying to ratf–k the El-Sayed campaign over Israel
- Mondoweiss: Book Review: A guide to how the media sanitized Israel’s genocide in Gaza
- Mondoweiss: Gulf states scramble to avert another U.S.-Israeli war on Iran they cannot stop
- Mondoweiss: The ‘blue wave’ is a defeat for Israel, but the left’s work is just beginning
- Mondoweiss: Dockworkers across the world strike for Palestine
- Common Dreams: ‘Deeply Alarming’: Hours Before Midterm Elections, Trump Bombs Iran’s Qeshm Island
- Electronic Intifada: The America I wish Palestinians could see
- Drop Site: Mike Rogers Earned $420,000 From Firm Now Helping Hegseth Plan Iran War‘s Next Phase
- The Nation: Haley Stevens’s Betrayal Is a Fiasco for the Democratic Establishment
- Counterpunch: Trump’s Attacks on Ilhan Omar Played to His Base Before the Midterm Elections. Will Democrats Follow Through on Their Promise to Investigate?
- Jewish Currents: The Election Cycle That Shattered the Pro-Israel Consensus
- The Intercept: Ashley Hinson’s Digital Chief Oversees Firm Paid Millions to Push Israeli Propaganda
- Common Dreams: Thomas Massie Gives Pete Hegseth a Choice: Resignation or Impeachment
- Responsible Statecraft: Neocons in full meltdown as voters punish GOP for Iran war
- Responsible Statecraft: The midterms were a referendum on Trump—and Biden—foreign policy
- The Nation: Abdul El-Sayed Triumphed. Trump and Islamophobia Lost
- Zeteo: 9 Impressive Midterm Wins You May Have Missed From the Blue Tsunami
