Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on May 10 (local time) said that he wants to gradually end Israel's dependence on military financial support from the US in the next decade, while promoting relations with Gulf countries.
In a television interview, Mr. Netanyahu said that Israel currently receives about 3.8 billion USD in military aid each year from the US. Washington has also pledged to provide a total of 38 billion USD in military aid to Israel in the period 2018 - 2028.
I want to reduce the US financial support in military cooperation to zero," Netanyahu declared, while saying that this is the right time to "re-establish" financial relations between the two countries.
According to Mr. Netanyahu, Israel should not wait for the next US Congressional term to start this process. He said he wants to deploy it right now.
Israel has long received bipartisan support in the US Congress for military aid packages. However, the level of support from lawmakers and the US public has declined since the Gaza conflict broke out in October 2023.
A survey by the Pew Research Center conducted in March 2026 showed that 60% of adults in the US have a negative view of Israel, while 59% said they have little or no longer trust Netanyahu in international affairs. Both rates increased by 7 percentage points compared to a year earlier.
Mr. Netanyahu said that the decline in support in the US is "almost 100% correlated" with the strong development of social networks. He accused some countries of manipulating social networks in a direction that is detrimental to Israel, although he affirmed that he does not support censorship.
