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U.S. Senator Carl Levin,
Michigan
As you may know, only 1.1% of the
current U.S. federal budget is spent on foreign assistance. This is
the lowest level in two decades. U.S. foreign aid supports the
promotion of democracy, combats drug trafficking, assists in
humanitarian relief, and works to improve the environment. In the wake
of the horrific events of September 11th illustrated, it is all the
more clear that our domestic security is related to the economic and
political stability of other nations.
In order to fulfill our responsibilities as a world leader, greater
resources should be devoted to international and humanitarian efforts.
Foreign aid plays a vital role in alleviating human suffering around
the world, while contributing to our nation's security.
Of the $16.19 billion designated for foreign operations programs in
the Fiscal Year 2003 (FY03) Omnibus Appropriations Act (P.L.108-7),
Congress provided $600 million in economic grants and $2.1 billion in
military grants for Israel. Congress also appropriated $615 million in
economic aid for Egypt and $1.3 billion in military assistance. Both
nations have received this aid since the Camp David Peace Accords of
1979, brokered by former President Carter. In his FY04 budget
proposal, the President requested $480 million in economic aid and
$2.16 billion in military grants for Israel.
In the Emergency Wartime Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2003
(P.L.108-11), Congress provided additional funds to allies who joined
with us in the conflict against Iraq. This included $1 billion in
military aid and $9 billion in economic loan guarantees over three
years for Israel. The economic loan guarantees will be provided under
the following conditions: the funds cannot be in the occupied
territories, the President can reduce the total of the loan guarantee
by an amount equal to the amount Israel spends on settlements in the
occupied territories; Israel will pay the subsidy to the money held in
escrow by the U.S. treasury pending a default on the loan; and the
President will determine if Israel meets certain budgetary and
economic reforms. The $9 billion will be repaid. In addition, 75
percent of the $1 billion in military aid must be used for purchases
of arms in the United States.
-Senator Carl Levin, Michigan
Yes, U.S. aid to
Israel should continue for the reasons stated.
Israel should
continue withdrawal from occupied Palestinian land. The U.S. should
stop feeding the Pentagon and feed the people instead. Other wealthy
nations, particularly Israel's Arab and other neighbors, should also
help support Israel, particularly to eradicate the poverty that exists
for all of its peoples.
-Amy, Northampton, MA
The American public
should recognize the difficult situation that Israel is in. Trying to
negotiate a peace on the one hand and deal with terrorism and suicide
bombings on the other.
-Yale,
no state given
Additional Resources
Many are in Adobe PDF format
-
CRS Report on Aid to
Israel
-
Wexner-Luntz Report on pro-Israel research in America
-
Economist reports on the real costs of aid to Israel
-
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs
- American
Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) priorities
- A Tragedy of Myths
Presentation
- University divestment campaigns
- Take the
quiz on aid to Israel
 reader who wished to remain anonymous
wrote, "the most plausible reform in aid to Israel would be to change
the payment schedule from an annual lump sum payment to quarterly
payments (like we do for other countries). This alone would save
taxpayers between $50-$60 million per year. The next step would be to
scrutinize how the aid is actually used by demanding audited annual
reports. That is not too much to ask considering we give them
$3
billion each year."
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A.F., Los Angles, CA
Aid to Israel violates at least three
U.S. laws, those against aid to
1) nuclear proliferators (WMD -remember?) 2) users of U.S. aid for
aggression 3) discriminators in labor policy. Perennial condemnation
of Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian land while continuing
to fund it is rank hypocrisy. The determining but relatively paltry
investment of the Israeli Lobby in campaign finance is repaid a
thousand fold in illegal aid to Israel - America's delinquent kid who
marauds the neighborhood and is rewarded by increases in its
allowance.
-A.F., Los Angeles, CA
We do not reap any
benefit from this relationship and Israel continues to be a liability
to us in the Arab and Muslim worlds where we could cultivate our
interests and the welfare of all the peoples of the region including
Israel rather than treating Israel as our favorite spoiled child that
can do no wrong. Israel has a national health system obviously funded
by our tax dollars whereby we have no national health system for our
citizens. Our citizenry should wake up and question our elected
officials about the wisdom and fairness of our traditionally lopsided
policy towards Israel.
-M.B., Binghampton, NY
I am against any
aid to Israel.
1. Those false
claims that Israel is a democracy has the right to defend its borders,
etc. need to be exposed. Democracy is based on justice and equality.
Israel lacks both. It is a racist state. The claimed "borders" are
occupied lands.
2. The claim that
prevention is justified for the US and accordingly for Israel is
false. Israel occupies the land by force. This is the root cause for
the instability in Palestine.
3. Of all the
claims, saying that Israel is the only true ally in the region is
outrageous... Israel spied on the US. Israel killed Americans on the "USS Liberty" during the 1967 war. On the other hand, the Arabs were
always willing to sell to and buy from the US.
-Mohamed, Peachtree City, GA
Aid to Israel must be cut off immediately in order to force this rogue
nation into behaving like a civilized country.
Israel is NOT the
only democracy in the Middle East and she surely isn't our friend
(remember the USS Liberty?). Israel stands for everything American
ideals condemn, including racial and religious discrimination,
collective punishment, wholesale confiscation of private property,
targeting of children, and denial of basic human rights to all people
except those who embrace Judaism. And Americans, fooled by
superstition and sloppy interpretation of scripture, lap it up and pay
the bills.
-Carolyn, Salt Lake City, UT
By financing and supporting Israel, we
are in fact accomplices of its crimes and made to pay for them. No
matter what spin and disinformation is put out in public, truth will
eventually emerge.
-Akaristos, no state given
American money is
best spent on Americans, in my opinion. With joblessness on a steady
rise these days, this money could be much better spent right here at
home.
-James, Belmont, PA
An article by David
R. Francis in the December 9, 2002 edition of The Christian Science
Monitor quotes Thomas Stauffer, a consulting economist in Washington "since
1973, Israel has cost the United States about $1.6 Trillion." This
is too much to a country that created a hostile environment for the
U.S. in the Middle East, perpetuated tensions, maintains an illegal
occupation, defied all U.N. resolutions, created terrorists against us
and threatened our oil supplies. Israel is not our ally, it is our
problem.
-Ahmad, Newcastle, PA
I am a 75 year old
native San Franciscan Jewish woman, and I am also an Israeli citizen
having lived and worked there for 9 years. I am totally, completely
and unutterable opposed to continuing any aid to Israel, and
especially military aid, until that government starts to obey, not
only international law, but also the laws of this country regarding
the use of military equipment bought from us.
-Zora, San Francisco, CA
I think Bush and the Congress have to
withdraw all aid to Israel. I suggest a policy that for every time
Israel engages in hostilities in Palestinian-held territory, the U.S.
withhold aid for a full calendar year.
-T., Athens, OH
I oppose any
further aid to Israel until a Middle East peace is obtained. Why isn't
there a national poll, i.e. Gallop to determine the feeling of the
general public?
-Gary, Mountain Lakes, NJ
We should NOT be
giving aid to Israel, a Jim Crow apartheid regime. I spent just a
week there last September, and the differences between the poverty of
the West Bank and Gaza and the wealth of Israel proper are
painstakingly obvious. As a black woman, I am quite aware of the
horrific numbers of black men in prison in this country but all this
pales in comparison to EVERY Palestinian man I met (saving one very
young one) having spent some time in jail. People are not even
allowed to travel from town to town in their own territory, let alone
in Israel.
I strongly support
our cutting all aid to Israel, unless it is linked to the breaking
down of the segregationist regime; ie, providing the security of
drinking water for Palestinians, jobs for Palestinians, and the end of
the notorious settlement building on Palestinian land.
-Kia, New York, NY
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Bob, Burlington, VT
I am a Jewish American, 56 years old,
related through my late grandfather Abraham Green to David
Ben-Gurion [Founder of the State of Israel]. I am entirely opposed to continuation of any U.S. aid
to Israel until and unless Israel:
1. Allows Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and land as
required by U.N. resolution 194 and the 4th Geneva Convention;
2. Removes all illegal settlements in the West Bank and Gaza as
required by the Geneva Convention and other international law;
3. Ceases its policies of ethnic cleansing, apartheid, torture,
assassination and all other crimes against humanity.
4. Puts all of its war criminals, including but not limited to Ariel
Sharon, on trial, either in Israel or in Belgium.
-Bob, Burlington, VT
US aid to Israel
should be made contingent upon its behavior, particularly its
adherence to the "Road Map." While security is naturally a principal
function of government, the Sharon government's policy of
assassination and occupation goes well beyond a defensive posture. If
the US is going to subsidize the Israeli government, the latter must
be willing to cooperate in real terms, not just in pretty phrases. It
can choose not to, but then it must accept the consequences: a very
substantial, if not complete, reduction in US aid.
-Rita, Portland, OR
US aid to Israel is
not likely to decrease anytime soon because the money goes through a
"revolving door" mechanism. Some money returns and goes into the
re-election fund for US politicians who then vote for more aid to the
Zionist enterprise. Other monies return in the form of
military/industrial contracts with US firms who then lobby for more
aid to the Jewish state.
A significant
portion of US aid returns to America in the form of Israeli contracts
with US public relations firms who steer US public opinion in the
pro-Israel direction. Those folks who accept this money are "Israel
First" Americans who pose as American patriots. It's treasonous
behavior.
-James, Spencerport, NY
I'm sympathetic to
Israel's dilemma. But I believe the leadership has become as bad in
its treatment of those it perceives as enemies as Hitler was of
non-Aryans.
Individually I have
a great respect for Jews and Israelis. But its appalling how this
country has manipulated its great heritage and tragic history to
perpetuate inhumanity and carnage. I think the assistance of the USA
should be adjusted to be more even-handed.
-Jeannine, no state given
I am for a
"reasonable" amount of aid to Israel- no more than 10% of our foreign
aid budget and with lots of conditions about how it can be used.
-Mary, Tacoma, WA
Israel has failed
to meet its obligations as an occupying power, it continues to violate
the Geneva Convention by illegally stripping the Palestinians of their
land, it practices murder and ethnic cleansing. If it wasn’t
Israeli’s special treatment by American politicians it would be, and
rightly so, labeled a war criminal state.
Israel should be called a “religious democracy” because
democracy is only available to Jews, members of other religions have
less rights than Jews. A true democracy can not be based on
religious preference.
-J.R., Pittsburg, PA
Support Israel?
Must we?...I don't know the
answers; I'm not even sure of all the questions. But the Palestinian
people do not deserve to be second-class citizens in the land called
by their name for 2000+ years. That much I do know. My heart goes out
to them, as is the case with most of the world.
No wonder they become human bombs; their life is much less than bleak.
-Marianne, no state given
"Aid to Israel" is a misnomer for
support of our Arms Industry.
-Barbara, East Lansing, MI
There is only one
type of terrorism, and that is what happened on 9/11. The freedom
fighters in the middle east are fighting for their lands. They are
patriots. Does that mean our fore fathers who fought the revolution
are terrorist? What the US and Israeli regime's have done is try to
create colonialism throughout the world by lies and deceit.
-D.J., New York, NY
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