Why us supports israel

Her advisors also worried it would alienate the United States, an assessment later confirmed by secretary of state Henry Kissinger.

The Egyptian and Syrian armies attacked Israel, striking on different fronts and each seeing early victories. But Israel was able to fight back, scoring air and sea wins and driving the Egyptian and Syrian armies back.

To draw in US support, Meir ordered planes with nuclear missiles to stand by on alert. It worked: Nixon ordered weapons and supplies to be airlifted to Israel. The supplies arrived just as Israel was starting to get the advantage, trapping a section of the Egyptian Army with no access to food or water. Israelis were eager to destroy the cornered Egyptians, but were stopped by Kissinger.

The Israelis complied. After the war, Kissinger continued to work on the Israelis to withdraw from some Arab lands. Kissinger saw the situation as a strategic opportunity.

Israel had again demonstrated definitively that it could militarily dominate other nations in the region and keep its enemies at bay. But Israeli might was dependent on Washington for funds, weaponry, and diplomatic cover.

And the United States got to position itself as the only force that could keep Israel in check. Kissinger was not alone in recognizing this value. With this good cop, bad cop routine, the US-Israeli relationship settled into its current form. And it reinforces the understanding that Israel can do whatever it wants, with the United States the only force capable of holding it back.

This is a tidy arrangement for the United States and Israel. The United States is able to exert its influence without direct involvement. And Israel continues on its course: settlements, military bombardments, displacement, and murder of Palestinians. Thankfully, there is increasing space in this country to describe and decry the injustice that Israel inflicts on Palestinians.

Israeli aggression is all too predictable at this point, but something entirely unprecedented happened this week in Washington, DC. Usually, an Israeli attack is an occasion for Democrats and Republicans to come together in support of Israel, a collective blind eye turned toward injured, dead, and displaced Palestinians. But at least half a dozen Congress members punctured the bipartisan display of support, with powerful denunciations of Israel and support for Palestinians.

A rally against the Gaza offensive in New York. Bilgin S. It's hard to know where one driver of America's Israel policy ends and another begins. For instance: early in his administration, President Obama pushed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to halt settlement growth in the West Bank; Netanyahu resisted this in part by rallying his allies in Congress.

Netanyahu's allies in both parties, who are always eager to appear pro-Israel, pressured Obama to drop his anti-settlements push, which he did. The question here is whether, in this case and others, US foreign policy interests or US domestic politics was ultimately more consequential to driving the US-Israel relationship.

For example, w ould Obama have pushed harder against settlements had Netanyahu not been able to call up so many allies in Congress? Were those members of Congress primarily driven by pure domestic politics, which do favor pro-Israel policies, by an earnest concern that Obama's approach was bad for Israelis, or by a belief that Obama was hurting US foreign policy interests? In thinking about the future of US-Israel relations, it's much more helpful to examine what might cause these broad-bush factors to change.

In simpler terms: is there a scenario under which the US and Israel drift apart? Barnett, the George Washington University scholar, sees Israel's continued occupation of the West Bank as the greatest threat to the relationship.

Israel's prime minister, Yitzhak Shamir, tried to fight it, but the Bush administration stood firm. Shamir lost, both in Congress and with the executive, because the Israeli position wasn't consistent with the US vision of a Western, democratic Israel. Beinart argues that Israel's ongoing occupation of the West Bank is already alienating younger and more secular Jews, and that AIPAC and other mainstream Jewish organizations risk losing their broad base of support unless they become more willing to criticize Israel on these points.

Barnett's conclusion only follows if you think "shared values" are the linchpin of US-Israel relations. Maybe the US would still think it's strategically useful to support Israel. Maybe Israel remains popular among certain Christians and the broader public regardless of its Palestinian policy. Maybe Israel comes to an agreement with the Palestinians and Barnett's point becomes moot.

For now, though, there's little evidence that American support for Israel is fundamentally breaking down — whether you think that's a good or bad thing. Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower through understanding. Financial contributions from our readers are a critical part of supporting our resource-intensive work and help us keep our journalism free for all.

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Why the US has the most pro-Israel foreign policy in the world. Reddit Pocket Flipboard Email. Obama and Netanyahu walk. In the hypothetical event that all U. Israel has both a major domestic arms industry and an existing military force far more capable and powerful than any conceivable combination of opposing forces. When Israel was less dominant militarily, there was no such consensus for U.

Though the recent escalation of terrorist attacks inside Israel has raised widespread concerns about the safety of the Israeli public, the vast majority of U. In short, the growing U.

Rather, as elsewhere, U. There is a broad bipartisan consensus among policymakers that Israel has advanced U. The pattern of U. After attacking Arab armies in the war were successfully countered by the largest U.

Aid quadrupled again in soon after the fall of the Shah, the election of the right-wing Likud government, and the ratification of the Camp David Treaty, which included provisions for increased military assistance that made it more of a tripartite military pact than a traditional peace agreement. Aid increased yet again soon after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

It also received another half million dollars for the development of a new jet fighter. During and immediately after the Gulf War, U. When Israel dramatically increased its repression in the occupied territories—including incursions into autonomous Palestinian territories provided in treaties guaranteed by the U.

The correlation is clear: the stronger and more willing to cooperate with U. Therefore, the continued high levels of U. Indeed, leaders of both American political parties have called not for the U. Since the terrorist attacks against the United States on September 11, there has again been some internal debate regarding how far the United States should back Israeli policies, now under the control of right-wing political leader Ariel Sharon. Former President Trump, driven by support for Israel from evangelical Christians and a like-minded leader in Netanyahu, was a staunch defender of Israel during his four years in office.

But pro-Palestinian groups are not nearly as active in US federal campaign spending. Within the US Democratic Party, a growing faction of progressives who support the Palestinians has gained prominence on the national stage. Lead among them are Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, both former contenders for the Democratic nomination for president in Sanders and Warren have called for conditioning US military aid to Israel on Palestinian human rights.

How can they credibly claim to stand for human rights? Joe Biden is not only US president to back Israel amid criticism of military operations and abuses against Palestinians. Israel claims self-defence, but the UN says, people living under occupation are entitled to defend their rights. By William Roberts. Published On 18 May This latest escalation in violence has killed at least Palestinians, including 61 children, while ten Israelis have died, including two children, So why is the US so unwavering in its support for Israel?

When did the US start supporting Israel? Why was Truman so quick to do that? What were the strategic stakes at the time?