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To say that israel invests in defense is at least 1/4 untrue, since the US sends billions every year. The US gave them about 7b cash last year, which is around

To say that israel invests in defense is at least 1/4 untrue, since the US sends billions every year. The US gave them about 7b cash last year, which is around 1/4 of their defense budget, and doesn’t include things like stationing carriers nearby, or doing airstrikes on houthi blockades. Us $ to israel: https://usafacts.org/answers/how-much-foreign-aid-does-the-us-provide/countries/israel/ https://usafacts.org/answers/how-much-foreign-aid-does-the-u... Israel defense budget: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-raise-defence-spending-meet-security-challenges-2025-07-17/ https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-raise-defen...

elcritch 10mo ago
That the US contributes doesn’t take away from the billions Israel did and does invest. The US defense contractors also get a big chunk of that aid. The US also gives similar levels of military aid to Egypt as well. The EU and US give billions to Ukraine. Gaza also receives billions in aid; substantial amounts of which has been hihacked and looted. For example this lady summer the UN reported that 88% of their aid trucks in Gaza were looted [1]. 1: https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2025/08/05/un-reports-88-percent-of-aid-trucks-slated-for-delivery-in-gaza-since-may-looted-along-routes/ https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2025/08/05/un-reports-88-percen...
- kennywinker 10mo ago
  > That the US contributes doesn’t take away from the billions Israel did and does invest Actually it does? It takes about 1/4 away. > The US also gives similar levels of military aid to Egypt as well. The EU and US give billions to Ukraine. Yes, the US uses defense aid to further their own agenda internationally, and funnel public dollars into private hands. > Gaza also receives billions in aid Food, medical, and infrastructure aid is not the same thing as weapons. > 88% of their aid trucks in Gaza were looted Ok? This tells me that both food and food aid are in short supply, if people are willing to take it by force. If myself and my family was starving, i would hyjack food trucks too. Wouldn’t you?
  - throw10920 10mo ago
    >> That the US contributes doesn’t take away from the billions Israel did and does invest > Actually it does? It takes about 1/4 away. It literally does not. The way that every English speaker uses the word "invests" is exactly the opposite of this. If you're going to speak English, you use words as native speakers use them and you don't make up your own definitions.
    - kennywinker 10mo ago
      I am a native english speaker. Israel “invests” ~30b in military spending. Of that, ~7b is not their own money, and the could not accept that money and spend it another way. Therefore, israel “invests” about 1/4 less than it would seem.
  - LorenPechtel 10mo ago
    They want you to think that. There is no way any group other than Hamas could be operating at that scale. It's Hams taking the aid to use it to control the population. It's not like they were actually starving--Hamas never managed to find a legitimately starving person to point a camera at. Every single person they paraded in front of the cameras had medical issues that were the cause of their problems. Just go look inside a hospice, should we conclude they are starving people?
    - kennywinker 10mo ago
      https://www.who.int/news/item/22-08-2025-famine-confirmed-for-first-time-in-gaza https://www.who.int/news/item/22-08-2025-famine-confirmed-fo...
      - FunnyUsername 10mo ago
        IPC had to ignore their own definition to declare a famine though. An actual famine involves at least 2 starvations per 10,000 people per day, among other requirements. According to Hamas' own data, Gaza was always several orders of magnitude short of that.
throw10920 10mo ago
> To say that israel invests in defense is at least 1/4 untrue, since the US sends billions every year. This is factually incorrect. The amount of money that the US gives Israel is completely and totally irrelevant to whether or not Israel also invests their own money in defense. The fact that the US has a problem with foreign influence literally does not matter for the statement above. To be clear, I don't agree with the GP's implied suggestion that Israel is more defensive than offensive, but making objectively incorrect statements is not a valid way to refute that.
- kennywinker 10mo ago
  Can i rephrase to help you understand my point? The defensive and offensive capabilities of Israel is about 1/4 larger because of american tax dollars not their own spending.
  - tguvot 10mo ago
    us aid is around 6% of defense budget
    - kennywinker 10mo ago
      1/4 by my reckoning. See links to my sources in the grandparent post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46452680 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46452680
      - tguvot 10mo ago
        israeli defense budget is around $35b-$45b usa aid is typically around $3b-$3.5b . 2024 higher aid is one off due to the war. also (unless i am wrong), good chunk of aid that Israel got from usa during war was in form of loans/guarantees for loans and such
        kennywinker 10mo ago
        Their military budget is wayyy up due to the war, so if you’re ignoring recent giving you should also be ignoring recent spending. In 2020 their military budget was ~21b. In 2020 the US gave 3.8b - so 21%, or 1/5. My number was based on 2024 budget and spending, which is why i said 1/4, but you’re probably right that pre-war numbers are more accurate if we’re talking about their long term spending trends. Sources: Israel military budget: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.CD?end=2020&locations=IL https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.CD?end=2020... US money to israel, page 6: https://www.congress.gov/crs_external_products/RL/PDF/RL33222/RL33222.39.pdf https://www.congress.gov/crs_external_products/RL/PDF/RL3322...

elcritch 10mo ago

That the US contributes doesn’t take away from the billions Israel did and does invest. The US defense contractors also get a big chunk of that aid. The US also gives similar levels of military aid to Egypt as well. The EU and US give billions to Ukraine. Gaza also receives billions in aid; substantial amounts of which has been hihacked and looted. For example this lady summer the UN reported that 88% of their aid trucks in Gaza were looted [1]. 1: https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2025/08/05/un-reports-88-percent-of-aid-trucks-slated-for-delivery-in-gaza-since-may-looted-along-routes/ https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2025/08/05/un-reports-88-percen...

kennywinker 10mo ago
> That the US contributes doesn’t take away from the billions Israel did and does invest Actually it does? It takes about 1/4 away. > The US also gives similar levels of military aid to Egypt as well. The EU and US give billions to Ukraine. Yes, the US uses defense aid to further their own agenda internationally, and funnel public dollars into private hands. > Gaza also receives billions in aid Food, medical, and infrastructure aid is not the same thing as weapons. > 88% of their aid trucks in Gaza were looted Ok? This tells me that both food and food aid are in short supply, if people are willing to take it by force. If myself and my family was starving, i would hyjack food trucks too. Wouldn’t you?
- throw10920 10mo ago
  >> That the US contributes doesn’t take away from the billions Israel did and does invest > Actually it does? It takes about 1/4 away. It literally does not. The way that every English speaker uses the word "invests" is exactly the opposite of this. If you're going to speak English, you use words as native speakers use them and you don't make up your own definitions.
  - kennywinker 10mo ago
    I am a native english speaker. Israel “invests” ~30b in military spending. Of that, ~7b is not their own money, and the could not accept that money and spend it another way. Therefore, israel “invests” about 1/4 less than it would seem.
- LorenPechtel 10mo ago
  They want you to think that. There is no way any group other than Hamas could be operating at that scale. It's Hams taking the aid to use it to control the population. It's not like they were actually starving--Hamas never managed to find a legitimately starving person to point a camera at. Every single person they paraded in front of the cameras had medical issues that were the cause of their problems. Just go look inside a hospice, should we conclude they are starving people?
  - kennywinker 10mo ago
    https://www.who.int/news/item/22-08-2025-famine-confirmed-for-first-time-in-gaza https://www.who.int/news/item/22-08-2025-famine-confirmed-fo...
    - FunnyUsername 10mo ago
      IPC had to ignore their own definition to declare a famine though. An actual famine involves at least 2 starvations per 10,000 people per day, among other requirements. According to Hamas' own data, Gaza was always several orders of magnitude short of that.

throw10920 10mo ago

> To say that israel invests in defense is at least 1/4 untrue, since the US sends billions every year. This is factually incorrect. The amount of money that the US gives Israel is completely and totally irrelevant to whether or not Israel also invests their own money in defense. The fact that the US has a problem with foreign influence literally does not matter for the statement above. To be clear, I don't agree with the GP's implied suggestion that Israel is more defensive than offensive, but making objectively incorrect statements is not a valid way to refute that.

kennywinker 10mo ago
Can i rephrase to help you understand my point? The defensive and offensive capabilities of Israel is about 1/4 larger because of american tax dollars not their own spending.
- tguvot 10mo ago
  us aid is around 6% of defense budget
  - kennywinker 10mo ago
    1/4 by my reckoning. See links to my sources in the grandparent post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46452680 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46452680
    - tguvot 10mo ago
      israeli defense budget is around $35b-$45b usa aid is typically around $3b-$3.5b . 2024 higher aid is one off due to the war. also (unless i am wrong), good chunk of aid that Israel got from usa during war was in form of loans/guarantees for loans and such
      - kennywinker 10mo ago
        Their military budget is wayyy up due to the war, so if you’re ignoring recent giving you should also be ignoring recent spending. In 2020 their military budget was ~21b. In 2020 the US gave 3.8b - so 21%, or 1/5. My number was based on 2024 budget and spending, which is why i said 1/4, but you’re probably right that pre-war numbers are more accurate if we’re talking about their long term spending trends. Sources: Israel military budget: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.CD?end=2020&locations=IL https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.CD?end=2020... US money to israel, page 6: https://www.congress.gov/crs_external_products/RL/PDF/RL33222/RL33222.39.pdf https://www.congress.gov/crs_external_products/RL/PDF/RL3322...