The United States has traditionally been Israel’s armory. Imports of American material, including high-tech weapons, have been the key to Israel’s military primacy in the Middle East. Arms sales to Israel have been taken for granted for decades. For this reason, the decision of the president of the United States, Joe Biden, to paralyze the shipment of offensive weapons to Israel if it undertakes a large-scale operation in Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip, represents a qualitative step in the relationship between both countries.
To make the message clear, and after weeks of fruitless talks in which the Government of Benjamin Netanyahu turned a deaf ear regarding Rafah, Biden decided last week to stop the shipment of a first shipment. There were 3,500 bombs: 1,800 of about 900 kilos and another 1,700 of 225. Biden, who already complained a few months ago about the “indiscriminate bombings” that in his opinion Israel was carrying out, acknowledged this Wednesday in an interview in the CNN that “civilians have died in Gaza as a result of these” American bombs.
The president of the United States stated in that interview that the invasion of Rafah “is simply a mistake.” “If they enter Rafah, I will not supply the weapons,” he added, making it clear that the flow that is being cut off is that of lethal weapons. “We are not going to supply the bombs and artillery shells,” he said, adding: “I have made it clear to Bibi [Netanyahu] and to the war cabinet that they will not count on our support if, in fact, they attack those population centers.”
The suspended shipment was not due to arrive in Israel for a few weeks, so in material terms it is not decisive in preventing a short-term operation in Rafah. But it is a warning from Israel’s main weapons supplier. According to a recent report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the United States accounted for 69% of imports of Israel’s main conventional weapons between 2019 and 2023.
According to data from the State Department, since its founding in 1948, the United States has provided Israel with more than $130 billion in bilateral aid focused on countering its threats, security cooperation, interoperability through joint exercises and helps Israel maintain the so-called “qualitative military advantage,” which Washington has assumed by law as its own obligation. That clause is important. In fact, in quantitative terms, according to SIPRI data, in the Middle East alone, the United States sold more weapons to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait than to Israel between 2019 and 2023.
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American aid to Israel has helped make its military one of the most powerful and effective in the world. Currently, a program negotiated last decade is in force. Near the end of his presidency, in September 2016, Barack Obama reached an agreement with Netanyahu as prime minister, in which the United States committed to allocate $38 billion in military aid to Israel over a 10-year period. . This includes 3.3 billion dollars (about 3.06 billion euros) annually in weapons and an additional 500 for Israeli air defense systems.
fighter jets
Israel has used those funds, among other things, to order 75 F-35 fighter jets, a plane undetectable by radar and considered the most advanced ever manufactured. Within that commitment for the country to maintain its “qualitative military advantage,” Israel was the first country other than the United States to receive an F-35 and was also, in fact, the first to use it in combat. It already has 30 of these devices and Washington has approved the delivery of new units.
Last October, when the State Department last took stock, the United States had 599 active arms sales operations to Israel valued at $23.8 billion, some of which require congressional approval. Among the priority initiatives were the F-35; CH-53K heavy lift helicopters; KC-46A aerial refueling tankers; and precision guided munitions.
From fiscal 2018 through 2022, the United States also authorized the permanent export of more than $12.2 billion in defense items to Israel through the direct commercial sales process. In those operations, Israel mainly purchased guided missiles, ballistic missiles, rockets, torpedoes, bombs and mines, aircraft, gas turbine engines and launch vehicles.
Since the Hamas attack last October, the Biden Government has been supplying weapons covered by previous authorizations or in dozens of shipments that did not require authorization due to their amount. He has also announced two additional operations in which he circumvented congressional approval by invoking emergency authority. In December, the White House approved the sale of nearly 14,000 rounds of tank ammunition and equipment to Israel, worth $106.5 million, and the sale of 155-millimeter caliber artillery shells and related equipment worth $106.5 million. 147.5 million dollars.
Biden qualified on Wednesday that even if he stopped sending bombs, howitzers and other lethal weapons, the United States would continue supplying defensive weapons to Israel. “We are going to continue to make sure that Israel is secure in terms of Iron Dome and its ability to respond to the attacks that came out of the Middle East recently,” he said.
In the law passed last month with aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, the Israeli package already prioritized defensive capabilities, providing some $5.2 billion to replenish air defense systems such as the Iron Dome and David’s Sling . These are the systems to intercept rockets, drones, missiles, planes and projectiles directed against its territory. Another 3.5 billion were allocated to the acquisition of advanced weapons systems through the Foreign Military Financing Program; 1,000 million were to improve the production and development of artillery and ammunition and 4,400 million were to replenish defense supplies and services.
This is the largest military disagreement between both countries since the first Lebanon war in 1982. Then, Ronald Reagan suspended the delivery of cluster bombs and other weapons. The previous year he had already decided to withhold the delivery of combat aircraft.
The United States has been Israel’s key military support, which ensures that it can continue with its plans alone. The White House maintains, perhaps with a small mouth, that it still hopes that the Netanyahu Government will not take the step. “It is a choice that Israel has to make,” John Kirby, spokesman for the National Security Council, said Thursday. “They know our position on the matter,” he added. And the consequences.
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