State Department document puts Israel's arms orders beyond 2028 at $10 billion

Trump said Tuesday he plans to end U.S. military aid to Israel

A State Department document sent to Congress and reviewed by The Wall Street Journal shows that Israel would need about $10 billion to pay for outstanding orders of U.S. military hardware beyond 2028. The document counts the orders as of April 1, and it was unclear how much that total might have changed since then. The total shows how hard it would be to phase out American funding for Israel, since purchases already made would still have to be paid for.

President Trump said Tuesday that he planned to end aid to Israel, The Wall Street Journal reported, catching Israeli officials, including some in the security establishment, off guard. Trump said ending direct aid would deprive Democratic critics of Israel of a political talking point, a reference to the campaign of Abdul El-Sayed, who was elected Tuesday as the first Muslim to serve in the U.S. Senate from Michigan. El-Sayed campaigned on ending unconditional aid to Israel.

U.S. and Israeli officials have been discussing a potential phasing out of American military aid for months. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the country should eventually wean itself off U.S. aid, proposing to eliminate direct aid over the coming decade.

The existing system rests on long-term commitments. The most recent is a 10-year memorandum of understanding agreed to by the Obama administration that runs through 2028 and pledges $3.3 billion each year in Foreign Military Financing, and the United States has already pledged nearly $7 billion in annual military aid over the next two years. Congress also approved about $26 billion in additional support for Israel in 2024, at the height of Israel’s war in Gaza following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack.

The funding is structured to let Israel use pledged future money to buy equipment before the money arrives, a system that gives American and Israeli officials more flexibility in shipping weapons to the country. Israel receives about $3.3 billion a year that can be used to buy U.S.-made hardware, including bombs, vehicles and jet fighters, making it one of the largest recipients of American military aid in the world.

A State Department letter to the office of Rep. Joaquin Castro (D., Texas), who inquired about the funds earlier this year, states that the requirements “could be covered either by FMF, national funds, or both,” meaning either the United States or Israel could end up paying for the orders. Castro said in an interview, “Even if the MOU ran its full course to 2028, there’s still $10 billion above and beyond that, and there’s an issue of who’s going to pay for that.” The State Department did not respond to a request for comment.

Current and former U.S. officials say an abrupt end to American military aid to Israel is unlikely. Josh Paul, a former State Department official who resigned during the Biden administration to protest its support for the war in Gaza, said, “It’s not plausible we stop by the end of this year” because Congress has already committed funding. Paul, who said he would support an aid shutdown, added, “We’ve not seen anything yet to substantiate this.”

American lawmakers have drafted legislation that would shift funding from foreign financing to defense investments and joint production of military technologies. The co-production proposal would write U.S.-Israel military cooperation into U.S. law as part of the National Defense Authorization Act, expected to be completed by the end of the year.

Advocates of the legislation said it would make it easier for the Pentagon to cooperate with Israel on procuring military technologies. Proponents hope it builds on past successes in defense cooperation, such as Israel’s Iron Dome air-defense system, which included the participation of American firms. Critics said the proposal would embed Israel deeper into Pentagon supply chains and programs in a way that would make such cooperation more difficult to repeal in a future Congress.

The proposal would not resolve who pays for orders scheduled for delivery in the future, such as Israel’s plan to buy a squadron of 25 new advanced F-35 jet fighters, and it would not address Israel’s immediate needs, which remain dependent on the regular flow of American-made armaments, including thousands of bombs the United States delivered in recent years during the wars. Unwinding the current system would likely take years.

Israel now spends around 7% of its gross domestic product on defense, more than any North Atlantic Treaty Organization member, even with U.S. aid. Paying for more of its own weapons could mean an increase in military spending after years of historically high outlays during recent conflicts. Ending American aid would also run up against existing U.S. law, which commits the government to ensuring that its military exports give Israel a “qualitative military edge” over potential rivals; cutting off aid would make that more difficult.

The shift comes amid declining support for Israel in both parties, following years of war in Gaza and Lebanon and this year’s joint American-Israeli attack on Iran. Democrats focused on Israel’s conduct in the war in Gaza, which has destroyed much of the enclave and killed more than 74,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian health authorities, which do not say how many were combatants.

The issue has also exposed tensions within the Republican Party. Vice President JD Vance, in a post on X, cited the war in Iran and the U.S. relationship with Israel among the top reasons voters went against Republicans in an election that produced major Republican losses in Congress. In a separate post Wednesday, Vance cited polling listing the top policy changes that would regain Republican support, including ending the war in Iran and changing the U.S. relationship with Israel.

Israel’s $10 billion in outstanding orders illustrates the challenge facing both critics of Israel who want to cut military aid and supporters who want to switch from aid to military co-production. The United States has provided Israel with a total of about $174 billion in military assistance and funding from the country’s founding in 1948 through May 2025, according to the Congressional Research Service, not adjusted for inflation.