[anapikoros]

Have you considered that if Israel didn't have to spend 10% of GDP on defence (and up to 20% in the past) because it is surrounded by militant Arab states (some also receiving arms aid from the USA now and the USSR previously) then Israel could get along nicely without US aid.

The sum total of US aid to the Arabs is many times that given to Israel and if it were to be reduced the first to complain would be Boeing, Loral, Raytheon and friends.

[OrthodoxPresbyterian]

Have you considered that if Israel didn't have to spend 10% of GDP on defence (and up to 20% in the past) because it is surrounded by militant Arab states (some also receiving arms aid from the USA now and the USSR previously) then Israel could get along nicely without US aid.

If memory serves, every major Israeli victory (1948, 1956, 1967, 1970, 1973) was won without substantive US financial aid. Nixon sent some Navy fighter-planes to help out in 1973, but that individual case of military action doesn't justify making Israeli domestic policy a hostage of US foreign aid monies today. US financial aid was only initiated in size in 1979... as an incentive to give up the vast buffer of the Sinai.

Too bad. The Sinai woulda made an okay "Palestinian State". They could've called it "Philistia" or something.