I have a piece in the New York Post today that suggests only a liar or an insane person would deny that Israel benefits from a political culture far healthier than the corrupted and diseased culture of the Palestinian polities. You can read it here. Mitt Romney pointed out the wild disparity in GDP in the areas controlled by the Palestinians and those under Israeli dominion. Someone on Twitter commented that Israel is a “welfare state” living off the U.S. and we should see what would happen if it were cut off.
Well, let’s see. U.S. aid to Israel has remained steady around $3 billion a year since the signing of the Camp David Accords in 1979. It was set that high in part because Israel surrendered functional oil fields to Egypt when it gave back the Sinai and lost a significant source of income. In 1980, that aid was enormously important to Israel’s general health. It constituted something like one-seventh of the nation’s overall GDP ($22.8 billion). Flash forward to 2011. Israel’s GDP was $245 billion. U.S. aid constituted 1/81st of Israel’s GDP.
What’s more, almost all that aid is in the form of military assistance, much of it in the form of support for Israel’s Iron Dome missile-defense efforts, which have direct R&D implications for the United States. In other words, Israel is testing, under real-world conditions, equipment the U.S. may need to use later.
And the Palestinians? A 2012 report from the World Bank explains that its economic growth since 2006 is almost entirely in the form of money garnered from abroad, which goes to fund government activities. “most of the recent economic growth can be attributed to the large inflow of aid, which has funded government expenditures. This has skewed the economy towards the public sector and non-tradables. Public administration, defense and other mostly public services such as health, education, electricity and water grew from less than 20 percent of GDP in 1994 to more than 27 percent in 2010….The importance of aid cannot be overstated and by 2008 current transfers had risen to about US$3.4 billion, double what they were in 2006.”
The World Bank blames Israeli actions in the wake of the Second Intifada for this, but those Israeli actions came as the result of terrorist aggression and the need for self-defense against Yasser Arafat’s insane war and Hamas’s murderous rocketry attacks. Which only strengthens Romney’s point about culture mattering when it comes to understanding Israel’s success and the dire condition of the Palestinians. And that the line about Israel being a welfare dependent of the United States is about as current as an Atari game system.
The 3B/year Israel receives is inconsequential at this point from the economic point of view. n nAt this point, its function is purely political. n nIt is an umbilical cord for the Israelis they are hesitant to cut. They don;t want to be adrift in the world without a superpower sponsor, if they can avoid it. n nIt is a leash for the US, yanked discreetly and not so discreetly, depending on who's in charge at the White House and State Dept. n nIt is a convenient baseball bat for Israel and Jew haters, who love to whine about all that money that 'could be spent at home' (they never consider what advantages to the USA the 3B buys).
I guess the conclusion to your argument left unsaid is that Israel would be wise to stop accepting aid from US, since it is a very costly exchange requiring surrendering at least some of their national sovereignty.
Yes. nA good scenario, albeit not without risk, is for Israel to take on and defeat Iran, alone, and forgo US financial aid. n nTo grow up, so to speak, and start acting like the righteous entitled nation it is – that has zero to apologize for- and a regional power – rather than a vassal state to the USA, begging savages for 'recognition'.
It should be noted that much of this military aid had to be spent in the U.S. Thus, the U.S. gave aid to Israel, true. But that money was spent in the U.S. for U.S. weapons and systems and, in turn, supported U.S. industries. Coupling that fact with the real-world testing of the systems, and the U.S. was a beneficiary to its own support for Israel. n nThat's not to deny that the money could have been spent elsewhere, only to show that Israel and the U.S. benefited by the expenditures.
Ceding the Sinai back to Egypt forced Israel to significantly enlarge her standing army. To assist her in meeting that increased defense cost Jimmy Carter agreed, during the Camp David peace talks, to commit the US to a substantial increase in aid. n nBut at this point, with Israel doing so well economically, it is an enormous mistake for her to continue to accept that stipend. The harm in resentment that creates for Israel in the US is much greater than the good it does her at home. n nSmart would be to graciously decline further aid, and even volunteer an annual pay back program. Our good will is now what she needs much more than a few bucks.
yeah right, because if Israel didn't get any US foreign aid they wouldn't be resented? please. n nit doesn't matter what Israel does or doesn't do. they will be vilified and despised. n nbut as a practical matter, Israel needs both our good will AND our bucks. and they need to know we have their back. I hope President Romney can start to repair the disaster that has been the Obama-Israel relationship. n nI have no problem with Israel receiving foreign aid for awhile still. they are a loyal ally. I'd much rather they get it than, oh, Pakistan, let's say. but let's wait until Israel's underwater natural gas field comes online. then they REALLY won't need us.
I wish Israel well with every bone in my body. And taking aid, when in need, is not objectionable. Yet an outstretched palm, where a gold watch gleams beneath an ostensibly ragged cuff, is an ugly thing. Americans should not be played for suckers. n nThey admire a gutsy, hard working, independent Israel. They consider her a light onto the nations and are proud to be her ally. A heroic, self reliant David deserves all our help, including active military collaboration against a genocidal Iran. n n But an Israel whose economy is advancing with leaps and bounds, even as ours staggers, should not be accepting, let alone asking for billions. The eternally wandering Jew cannot have come to rest in the land of the eternal Jewish shnorrer. Israelis deserve to be respected; as mendicants they must expect contempt. n nIsrael's great failure is in Hasbara. There she keeps shooting herself in the stomach. She seems not to understand that accepting expensive gifts carries a cost. The only ones who will be sorry when she cuts herself free from that golden chain will be her enemies. n nFinland had the dignity to repay, unasked, the foreign aid extended to her by the US. The Germans set up their Marshall Fund in gratitude for the Marshall Plan. Israel will be wise to do something similar.
We will ALWAYS need America! nPerhaps not the aid; perhaps not the headache; perhaps not the hectoring and bullying that Barry-boy has subjected. Those we need like a hole in the head. nBut, as two brothers, we will ALWAYS need you. The day will come when there is no dependency in the relationship…and still you and we will be abused by the media and the left, in your country and mine, (not to mention in the rest of the world!) because we share the same Freedom-Loving DNA. nAnd like the old Native Indian rite of making blood brothers we will sustain each other in life no matter what the others say, and we will fight side by side unto death if necessary. nYou think THAT will end when you stop giving us your $3Billion?
Let's hope Americans and Israelis remain good friends indefinitely. Agreed, both nations are genuine democracies. The entrepreneurial spirit is at the dynamic of both. The cultures of both have been deeply influenced by the Bible, the Old Testament. n nMoreover, neither is mere demographic material. Each sees itself as exceptional, with a mission in this world. Israel aspires to be exemplary, a light onto the nations, a healer, an engine of progress. The US, unique as a multiracial, multi ethnic nation of immigrants, strides ever into "the wilderness of untried things" (Melville). She has been at the helm as the globe exploded from 2 billion to over six billion, and modernity and human rights have become the ambition of all. n nAnd yet, though both nations have important commonalities and mutual interests, they are not joined at the hip. The US establishment supported Israel only grudgingly in 1948 and embargoed her. Eisenhower opposed Israel in 1956. Israel fought the Six Day war with British tanks and French planes because the US was still not selling her heavy weapons. US financial aid to Israel was in line with that of other countries her size in the early decades. It was because, as Nasser said, the road to Riyadh leads through Tel Aviv, that Israel became strategically important to the US. With the end of the Cold War, and America's ability, as in Kuwait in 1990, to defend her own interest, that has changed. Our DNA is not the same. President Carter allowed the Zionism is Racism resolution to pass. Obama's sympathy is for the Palestinians. We are not blood brothers. We have never fought side by side until death. n nThe American population is changing. Many Americans on the Left see Israel's very ability to overcome 50 to 1 odds as contumacy and a spurning of the spirit of democracy. She undermines their faith in equality. Thus she is reviled as racist, as a challenge to the future and the enemy of peace. That is crazy, but it is the way of this world. n nIsrael needs the US more than the US needs Israel. It is a relationship that must not be taken for granted. It needs cultivating.
There are two way, Nac, to end the "aid" given by the US to Israel: n1)Israel says thank you and refuses to take any more n2) America says thank you and refuses to give any more nTell me Nac: were option No.1 chosen what would you say: Those wicked Zionists have used and abused us and now want nothing more to do with us. That's most certainly what the MSM in your country would say! nAnd option No.2: Ahh! The MSM in your country would most certainly spin it as, yes, thank goodness we don't give them money anymore, and now the ungrateful dogs will no longer share their R&D, intelligence, defence with us…because we are no longer supporting them with money. nWhat you think that's toooo acrimonious? toooo vindictive? nYou know that the media all over the world hates the fact that we are "married" to America; they will hate it more when we are "divorced" from America….and yes…divorces are always vindictive, acrimonious, messy…often more so than the marriage of convenience that preceded it!
Your first option is by far superior. n nTo say, thanks for all your generosity, but we can make it on our own now, won't be disdainful or interpreted as such. The US and Israel are not married. Neither has a claim on the other. The end of charity need not be the end of a friendship or of mutual cooperation. n nThe only ones appalled will be Israel haters who will regret loosing that cudgel.
America gives us Loan Guarantees to the tune of $3billion anually because we FORCE you to? We blackmail you to? We demand and you comply?
No. We get those out of the goodness of the American heart and because it serves America’s interest…and you want Israel to be ungracious enough to tell America it no longer wants her money???
Bet you wouldn’t do that if you were given a similar deal!
Your monetary gift to Israel does not make you suckers, nor us beggars!