Benjamin Netanyahu and his challenger Gadi Eisenkot hold divergent views on several policy fronts, yet both anticipate continued U.S. military aid totaling billions.
In the early hours on Friday, as vote counting reached 99.5 percent, the Israeli Central Elections Committee released the final tally of Knesset seats. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing bloc secured the largest share, though it sat well below its 2022 level. The bloc, according to The Times of Israel, will enter the Knesset with 53 seats, while the main opposition bloc led by Gadi Eisenkot will hold 48. With neither side achieving the 61 seats needed for a majority, coalition negotiations among the nine Zionist factions and the two Arab-interest parties will be essential to forming a government.
Regardless of who ends up as Israel’s prime minister, one certainty remains for Americans: the next Israeli leader is likely to persist in pursuing Middle East wars financed by American money and weaponry.
Under Netanyahu, who has served 19 nonconsecutive years as prime minister, Israel has engaged in controversial and expansive wars across the region. Throughout these conflicts, the United States has armed and funded Israel. Although aid continued throughout the Cold War, Washington began regularly renewing 10-year funding commitments starting in FY 1999. Under the current framework, which took effect in FY 2019, the United States pledged about $38 billion in military aid to Israel through FY 2028, contingent on congressional appropriations.
A sizable portion of this aid—$33 billion under the current framework, according to CRS—has been disbursed through Foreign Military Financing (FMF) grants. FMF allows partner countries to purchase American weapons, with the costs effectively reimbursed by U.S. taxpayers. Data from the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, which manages U.S. arms transfers, show that from FY 2020 to FY 2024, nearly $13 billion—90.5 percent—of U.S.-to-Israel arms transfers were funded by FMF. Last year, CRS found that FMF grants to Israel accounted for roughly 14% of the overall Israeli defense budget.
Earlier this month, Al Jazeera reported that since Hamas’ October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, the United States has approved $33.16 billion in arms transfers to Israel, almost all of which was funded by FMF grants.
Netanyahu has stated his intent to reduce Israel’s dependency on a donor-recipient aid model and to pursue greater joint defense collaboration. The U.S. and Israel already co-develop certain weapon systems, such as David’s Sling and the Iron Dome missile defense network, but, as The Washington Post notes, Washington covers the bulk of these projects. A CRS report issued earlier this year explains how difficult it would be for Israel to move away from U.S. assistance: “With a fleet of fighter aircraft that is almost entirely American-made and a missile-defense architecture that relies on U.S. assistance,” the CRS writes, “Israel may remain dependent for quite some time on U.S. supply chains and, during military operations, direct defensive U.S. military support.”
Should an Eisenkot-led coalition win the forthcoming government negotiations, the prospect of Washington reducing aid appears unlikely as well. Eisenkot has made clear that his government would expect continued U.S. financial backing, telling BizPortal earlier this week that he would keep pursuing the $3.8 billion in annual aid the United States currently provides. He has also praised “[U.S. President Donald] Trump’s decision to strike Iran together with Israel,” telling the New York Post it was “courageous.”
If he becomes prime minister, the likelihood of resolving conflicts between Israel and Iran, or with any neighboring states, remains low, a reality that CRS notes comes at the expense of American taxpayers.
With public debt exceeding $32 trillion, the United States clearly faces pressure to curb spending. Military aid to highly developed nations like Israel stands out as a potential target. However, given America’s long history of underwriting the country and Trump’s steadfast support, those hoping for relief should not count on a rapid shift.
