White House spokesman Josh Earnest warned Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday that there was a limit to the ability of the US to accede to Israel's request for more military aid. In the daily press briefing Earnest said while the US was prepared to preserve Israel's qualitative military edge, the negotiations on the aid package were taking place in the shadow of severe budgetary constraints in the US.
On Sunday, Netanyahu said at the weekly cabinet meeting that there was no certainty that Israel and the US would reach agreement on a new memorandum of understanding governing US military aid to Israel for ten years from 2018. "If we don't manage to reach an agreement with the current administration, we will have to reach an agreement with the next administration," Netanyahu said. Israeli daily "Haaretz" quoted senior US government sources as saying that Netanyahu would do well to sign a new memorandum of understanding with the current administration since the fiscal situation in the US was not expected to improve in the next two years and Israel would not find a president more committed to its security than Barack Obama.
Yesterday, the US administration decided to give stronger expression to its displeasure at Netanyahu's remarks and upgraded its response from anonymous "senior officials" to an official White House statement. The spokesperson said that Obama had proposed negotiations on the new memorandum of understanding as early as 2013, when he visited Israel, but that Netanyahu preferred to wait until 2015 to open the talks. Three rounds of talks have taken place so far, with the latest round taking place last week between a US team that came to Israel and an Israeli team.
The White House spokesperson refrained from commenting directly on Netanyahu's statement about waiting for the election of a new US president, but a "senior official" was quoted by Reuters yesterday as calling on Netanyahu to accept the current US proposal, and as saying that it was unlikely that the next incumbent in the White House, whoever it might be, would demonstrate stronger commitment to Israel's security.
"Defense News" reported last September that Israel aspired to aid of $50 billion over ten years, that is, $5 million annually, compared with a current $3.1 billion. This would represent a rise of 60%. In November last year, sources in Congress confirmed to Reuters that this was indeed Israel's initial request, and that the administration would not meet it in full.
In Israel's request the planned expanded aid package is in addition to separate aid for development and procurement of missile defense systems, which surpassed $500 million in 2015, and aid for developing technologies for detecting tunnels, probably of $25 million annually.
Yesterday, Reuters reported that Israel had reduced its request to $4 billion annually. According to a source in Congress, the talks now focus on a US proposal of $3.7 billion annually. It is not clear whether the Americans agree to a separate aid package for missile defense systems.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on February 9, 2016
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