USA’s military magnanimity towards Israel and the genocide in Gaza

“Israel is a strategic albatross around USA’s neck” John Mearsheimer.

Since the onset of October 7^th episode of Israel’s settler colonialism in Palestine, USA has granted approximately 22.76 Billion USD in aid to Israel. Around 45,000 Palestinians have been butchered in the meantime by IDF (costs of war report 2024). What role has been played by the USA and Israel’s military alliance in this apartheid? What level of strategic support has solidified itself between the two birds of a feather? Who are the veiled beneficiaries of this inhumane brutality? This article takes a morally suffocating ride to the depths of strategic deals covert as well as overt secured between the USA and Israel and strives to bring on surface the dark but true reality.

USA has granted almost 251.2 Billion USD to Israel in military and non-military aid since 1959. It is incumbent to mention that this amount does not corroborate to the total amount of aid provided by US to Israel. When one brings the investigation square to Gaza genocide (October 2023-present) the total official aid surpasses the figure of 17 Billion USD (3.8 Billion FMF aid and 14.1 Billion approved by Biden administration in April 2024). The aforementioned figure only represents the transactions that were successful in finding their way to the official spreadsheets. Prominent sources, however, report that Biden administration has ratified more than 100 arms deals with Israel which did not pass the required threshold to be notified to the Congress. Therefore, it is inauspicious to comment on the exact amount of aid delivered to Israel since October 7 (costs of war report 2024).

The military aid to Israel is provided through various channels of US administration. Foremost, the USA has signed a MOU with Israel for a period of ten years (2019-2028) under the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) programs which provides for annual military installment of 3.8 Billion USD to Israel. Along with that, the military aid arrives from existing US stocks in Israel, including the multi-billion-dollar WRSA-I stocks of USA located in Israel, commercial sales approved by the state department, Foreign military sales (FMS) approved by state, FMF, and Excess defense Articles (EDA) which allows other states for purchasing used systems of US force for free or on steeply discounted prices.

The explicit details of US arms deliveries to Israel since October 7^th, 2023 to September, 2024 entail: 4,127,000 kilograms JP-8 jet fuel, 57,000m 155mm artillery shells, 36,000 rounds of 30mm cannon ammunition, 20,000 M4A1 rifles, 13,981 anti-tank missiles, 8,700 (Mk82) 500-pound bombs, 3,500 night vision devices, 3,000 Joint Direct attack Munitions, 1,800 (M14) bunker buster bombs, 2,600 (250 pound) small diameter bombs, 200 switch blade (series 600) drones, more than 100 Sky Elio Xseries drones, and 75 Joint Light Tactical Vehicles (JLTV) (Reuters).

Mearsheimer iterates in an interview, as mentioned earlier, that Israel is a strategic albatross around USA’s neck. Why is it then that the strongest state of the world so docilly accepts this albatross around its neck? For the answer to this ambiguity, one must look at the notorious Military industrial complex (MIC) of the USA. The strategic albatross, though provided with annual military aid installment from US, is required to spend the majority of that aid on purchases from the US military companies under the very text of the abovementioned MOU. Therefore, dozens of US military companies earn a vast profit from Israel’s bloody adventures in the Middle East.

Boeing, one of the US military companies, has made transactions of almost 1000 small diameter bombs and 1800 Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) kits to Israel. Furthermore, the air -to-surface missiles for F-16, and F-15 fighter jet engines of Israel are purchased from RTX. In addition, RTX and Israeli weapons company run a joint venture named Rafael for the production of interceptors for Israel’s Iron Dome. The metal bodies for the MK-80 bomb series (the primary aerial munitions used by Israel in Gaza) are developed by General Dynamics. Caterpillar, another US military company, sells D9 armored bulldozer which has been employed by the IDF to discombobulate Palestinian homes and infrastructure in the occupied West Bank and the Israel’s ground invasion of the Gaza strip. (costs of war report 2024)

In the realm of strategic studies, one comes across multiple cases of military ties between different state allies, but the one between the USA and Israel stands peculiarly outlandish to the normal trend. Howbeit, upon a much deeper and holistic analysis, one comes close to locate the possible cause for this peculiarity: a symbiotic relationship between the war industry of the USA and the states fervently ambitious to quench their thirsts of Machiavellian endeavors. The aforementioned statistics are just one chapter in the many volumes’ odyssey of wars, genocides, civil strife, and terrorism all around the world, all finding their strings advertently attached to the iniquitous war industry of the USA. 

Madiha Fatima, student of International Relations at National Defense University, Islamabad, Pakistan. She holds profound interest in post-colonialsm, international law, and foreign policy