US to end $4 billion in annual military aid to Israel after 2026: Trump

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that the United States will cease providing $4 billion in annual military aid to Israel by the end of this year, in comments that reportedly caught Israeli security and financial officials off guard.However, Trump said the US would continue selling weapons to Israel and would provide assistance if required, signalling a possible shift in the decades-old military relationship between the two allies.Making the surprise announcement on Election Day, as Americans voted in crucial midterm elections, Trump said Israel no longer needed the financial assistance. He also suggested the move would weaken a criticism frequently used by left-wing Democrats against Republicans over Washington's support for Israel.
“As far as paying Israel, Bibi Netanyahu and I have made a deal — we give Israel $4 billion a year — we made a deal months ago that we’re stopping,” Trump told Fox News in a phone interview.Trump said. “We’ll help Israel if they need it. They’ve been a great ally, and we’ve been the greatest of all allies.” Trump did not explain how the funding would be stopped by December, given that the existing US-Israel Memorandum of Understanding, which provides USD 3.8 billion in annual military assistance, remains in effect until September 2028.The US spends more on military aid to Israel than to any other country, but the memorandum of understanding which began in 2019 requires the majority of those funds to be spent on weapons manufactured in the US.
Officials in the Israeli Finance Ministry said on Tuesday they were surprised by Trump’s announcement, the Walla news site reported.While Netanyahu has spoken publicly and repeatedly about ending US military assistance to Israel, he has talked about doing so gradually over the next decade — not all at once as Trump was now claiming. In a June letter to a US ​congressman, he wrote that the time had come for Israel “to move from aid recipient to partner.”