Trump announces halt to $4 bn in aid to Israel on midterm election day

The US will stop providing $4 billion in annual military assistance to Israel starting next year, President Donald Trump has said. West Jerusalem supposedly does not need the money anyway, and the issue is exploited by the "left" to generate bad publicity for the US government at home, he told Fox & Friends on Tuesday as Americans were heading to the polls for the midterm elections.

Political Timing

Trump stated he had reached an agreement on the issue with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. According to the president, the prime minister raised the issue himself. "We give them more than anybody else, and they no longer need it. We've been doing it for years. I've been doing it, but Israel is a very thriving country. They don't need it," Trump said in a phone interview with Fox.

Obama-Era Deal

Trump was referring to the sum provided by the US as part of the 2016 Memorandum of Understanding reached between Israel and the administration of then President Barack Obama. The White House called the deal for Washington to pay a total of $38 billion to the Israeli military over 10 years "the largest single pledge of military assistance in US history." The agreement was due to expire in 2028.

Declining Support

Various opinion polls published this year also suggested that US public support for Washington's aid to Israel was declining. According to a survey published by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs last month, 56% of Americans said that military assistance to Israel should be either decreased or stopped altogether, up from 38% in 2012.

A July poll by AP-NORC suggested that 40% of Americans considered the US to be too supportive of Israel, up from 37% in early 2024. The general view of Israel and its government among Americans has also been in steady decline over the past several years, according to a Pew Research Center report published the same month.

Broader Context

US military aid to Israel is not limited to the Obama-era deal. A 2025 study by William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, a Washington-based think tank, stated that the administrations of presidents Joe Biden and Donald Trump additionally spent a total of $21.7 billion on military assistance to West Jerusalem in the two years after the October 2023 Hamas attack.

The assault claimed the lives of 1,200 Israelis, with around 250 being taken hostage. It also prompted West Jerusalem's military campaign in Gaza, including airstrikes and a ground offensive that killed more than 74,000 Palestinians, leading to accusations of genocide against Israel.