Pulling the Funding: Trump, Israel and US Military Assistance

 

By Dr. Binoy Kampmark

Global Research, November 05, 2026

Region: Middle East & North Africa, USA

Theme: Militarization and WMD, Politics

In a telephone interview on Fox News on the morning of November 3, President Donald Trump revealed that a deal had been struck with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cease the annual provision of US$3.8 billion in military assistance after 2026. 

“We already agreed that by the end of this year, we won’t be paying Israel,” he said. “Now we’ll help Israel if they need it.” 

This was a deal that had been reached “months ago”.

The current funding arrangements arose out of a pledge from the Obama administration to supply military assistance to Israel over the period from 2019 to 2028 for a decade, amounting to US$38 billion. Each year, Washington would supply $US3.3 billion in Foreign Military Financing (FMF) and US$500 million in missile defence funding.  The memorandum replaced the previous MOU signed in 2007 that expired in 2018, worth US$30 billion. (Since its founding, Israel has been the largest cumulative recipient of US economic and military assistance, receiving US$300 billion in inflation adjusted terms between 1948 and 2024.)

In a September 2016 fact sheet released by the White House Office of the Press Secretary, the MOU was described as permitting “Israel to update the lion’s share of its fighter aircraft fleet – including through the acquisition of additional F-35s – increase its missile defense, and acquire other defense capabilities needed to meet its threat environment.” But these new arrangements were also intended to eliminate two “anomalies” deemed problematic to US interests, the first being Off Shore Procurement, under which Israel was given the luxury of using up to 26.3% of its annual FMF package on non-US products, and Israel’s use of FMF funds to acquire fuel. The press release, in satisfied tones, noted that Israel would be able to “spend more funding, as much as $1.2 billion per year, on advanced military capabilities that only the United States can provide.” Arms manufacturers had every reason to rejoice.

The Fox News interview lit the fires of speculation. Did Trump’s announcement have anything to do with the midterm elections that the Republicans risked losing by some margin? The memorandum of understanding between the countries did, after all, state that funding would last till 2028. This particular electoral campaign had been marked by the candidatures, and eventual successes, of a number of sharp critics of Israeli policy, with the Democrat’s Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan being foremost among them.

Political memory can be short and, bathed in the shrinking properties of social media, a mere flash. For all that, any partially alert student of politics will be aware that the argument towards greater self-reliance on Israel’s part, and a weaning off the cash supplied by the US military industrial complex, has been a preoccupation for some time. The Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023, followed by Israel’s sanguinary retaliation in Gaza, stirred the think tanks and security establishment towards the proposition that such reliance fostered an unnecessary vulnerability that could, at some point, bite.

In September 2025, Netanyahu openly entertained the notion of less-than-splendid isolation in a speech at a conference of the Finance Ministry’s accountant general in Jerusalem. Economically, Israel would “increasingly need to adapt to an economy with autarkic characteristics.” Despite professing to hate the term, calling himself a “believer in the free market”, the PM feared that Israel could find itself “in a situation where our arms industries are blocked. We will need to develop arms industries here – not only research and development, but also the ability to produce what we need.”

An underbaked classical analogy was suggested: Israel would have to become “Athens and super-Sparta.”  There was no choice: “in the coming years, at least, we will have to deal with these attempts to isolate us.” Such attempts were not merely gestational.  Europe, because of decisions made to encourage “limitless migration”, had seen the greater demographic prominence of a “significant minority” of “belligerent” Muslims. Their presence was catalytic for the creation of “limitations” and encouraging “sanctions” against the Jewish state. Economic sanctions would be followed by arms embargoes. In terms of reputation, Israel was also suffering a battering at the hands of Chinese and Qatari efforts to “influence Western media with an anti-Israel agenda, using bots, artificial intelligence, and advertisements”.

In his May interview with CBS, Netanyahu also expressed his wish to “draw down” US military funding “to zero”. 

“Let’s start now and do so over the next decade, over the next ten years, but I want to start now. I don’t want to wait for the next Congress. I want to start now.”

Image: Retired Major General Tamir Hayman (CC BY-SA 3.0)

The subject of Israel wriggling off the sustenance of the US purse (a purse often used with few conditions) was made clear in a paper published last month by retired Major General Tamir Hayman, Director of Israel’s sanctum of strategic doctrine, the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS). The document is unfussed, unsettling and unflinchingly parochial. In searching for what he regards as Israel’s evolving “national security concept” after October 7, 2023, Hayman advances several notions, cohering around the idea of a national identity that cannot be questioned. Ten revealing suggestions prioritising the essence of war as “foundational” and peace as “an expression of weakness” are proposed, the fifth being salient to US-Israeli relations.

“Although important, the relationship with the United States is driven purely by interests. Furthermore, excessive adherence to restrictions imposed on Israel by a US administration is dangerous: The United States is a ‘declining power’ and, given its ongoing social and political shifts, will soon abandon Israel in any event.”

Hayman considers this loss of feeling as reciprocal and axiomatic to an inevitable, even frosty change. US abandonment will take place, largely due to “the influence of a progressive American value system that is incompatible with Israel’s Jewish character”. It follows that Israel will have to take stock.

“Severing ties with the United States is therefore not only inevitable, but essential to Israel’s independence and the resilience of its Jewish national identity.”

The tenth proposal draws on Netanyahu’s concerns about economic risks. A picture of militarised autarky is duly sketched. 

“Israel’s defense economy is highly vulnerable to long supply chains; therefore, domestic production and investment in the defense-tech sector (defense industries, cyber, and artificial intelligence) must be prioritized over other sectors.” 

Scientific research aiding technology was fundamental “but should be advanced independently rather than through international frameworks such as ‘Horizon’.”

Often typical in these sojourns of strategic thought is the occluding of a messier, more pungent reality. Hayman neglects the complex, often troubling role played by American Christian Zionists who, while historically antisemitic, treasure Israel as a glorified guardsman janitor, minding the Holy Lands for the Messiah’s second coming and Armageddon’s fiery terminus. Money and support will hardly diminish, nor will their influence on American politics.

It follows that this latest turn by Trump cannot be seen as astonishing or even intrinsically bound to the electoral activism that led to the midterm Democratic Blue Wash in Congress. Military cooperation between the powers, doctrinally and practically, will continue. Weapons of US-manufacture will still find their way into the arsenal of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) for ready use, whatever and whoever the targets turn out to be. And the door on further purchases of American military hardware is, as Trump has affirmed, hardly closed.

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). Email: bkampmark@gmail.com.

Featured image: President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speak privately in the Vermeil Room before a dinner, Monday, July 7, 2025, at the White House. (Official White House Photo by Daniel Torok)

The Blue Tsunami: US Midterm Elections Results. Is Everything Going to Be Alright Now?

 

By Hermann Ploppa

Global Research, November 05, 2026

Region: USA

Theme: Politics

The Republicans suffered a more devastating defeat than expected. But the real losers of this election will ultimately be the ordinary Americans.

***

The midterm elections in the USA on November 3, 2026: a cold shower for the oligarchs’ fever dreams. The lords of the world, like our highly esteemed tech billionaire Elon Musk, had poured hundreds of millions of dollars from their pocket change into this midterm election to buy the election results. The super-rich naturally invest in politics to secure optimal investment conditions through dependent politicians. A total of almost 12 billion dollars was pumped into this election campaign[1]. The tech oligarchs fabricate public opinion to their liking with newspaper ads, TV commercials, or influencers and bots on the internet[2].

But what was actually supposed to be a calculated distortion of competition has now become a stigma for the political actors sponsored by the oligarchs. They fell one after another. The US citizens chased them away. And they chose people from real life, from real practice. People like Abdul El-Sayed, who had led the Detroit Health Department for years. The Democrats were able to successfully portray themselves as disadvantaged compared to the Republicans. All Democratic candidates repeatedly pointed to the Republicans’ funding by super-rich benefactors. Thus, the Democrats managed to not only regain the majority in the Washington House of Representatives but even the majority in the Senate. In addition, the Democrats snatched numerous governorships from the Republicans. Governors are the heads of government of the individual states. If the governors stand in Washington’s way, it can really hurt. The loss of power in Texas has particularly hurt the Republicans. The 37-year-old perennial confirmand James Talarico won a Senate seat in Texas for the Democrats for the first time in many decades. His Republican opponent Ken Paxton was hopelessly overrepresented compared to Talarico with 168 million in campaign support from Elon Musk in commercials[3]. But it was precisely with the sponsorship of his rival that Talarico was able to lure his supporters to the polls. It was precisely this interference by the super-rich that also prompted the Texans to make a relatively unknown woman from the Hispanic community, Gina Hinojosa, their new governor.

The super-rich entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswami is already known to us. Ramaswami was supposed to co-lead the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) with Elon Musk. But that didn’t happen. Now Ramaswami tried his luck as a candidate for the governorship of Ohio. From his own pocket, he injected about 50 million dollars into the campaign fund[4]. With this, he financed TV spots in which his rival Amy Acton was attacked below the belt[5]. In one of Ramaswami’s ads, Amy Acton’s mother appeared and claimed that her daughter had always been a liar. Background: Amy Acton had been sexually abused by her stepfather. Acton’s mother had tolerated and covered it up. Since early childhood, Amy had not seen her mother again. So, a really terrible story. To exploit something like that and air the family’s dirty laundry in public for one’s own campaign purposes – that didn’t sit well with Ramaswami. Even Republicans condemned this smear campaign. In Ohio, in addition to the aversion to the arrogance of the super-rich, there was now moral outrage. Ramaswami not only lost the election resoundingly to Amy Acton – he also burned through about 50 million dollars.

However, the multimillionaire Rick Jackson in the state of Georgia has really outdone himself. Jackson financed his campaign for the governorship with 222.2 million of his own money. His Democratic opponent, Keisha Lance Bottoms, had to make do with just 11.7 million dollars for the campaign[6]. But even here, the supposed disadvantage turned into an advantage. The Democrat Bottoms won the election with a lead of almost ten percent against Rick Jackson.

Image source

Along with the anger against oligarchs, there was also the defensive battle against the advance of artificial intelligence. The Democrats were also able to leverage this issue for their advantage. Simultaneously with the congressional and gubernatorial elections, votes were held on whether data centers could be built or not. With few exceptions, voters opposed the construction of data centers in their region. The movement against AI data centers is gaining more and more traction in the USA[7]. The voracious data centers are taking away the electricity and water that people in the area absolutely need to live. This means that the bursting of the AI bubble is getting closer. The AI industry has already firmly planned the additional energy capacities. That means: if the data centers don’t work out, it will be a massive blow to the AI investors. And the motto of the punk movement, namely “No Future,” is turning from a rather playful game into a threatening perspective for the young people who are now pushing into the workforce. They have the justified fear of having to drift through adult life poor and unemployed. No wonder seventy percent of young people voted for the Democrats.

The Real Inspirer of the Blue Tsunami: Donald Trump

This crushing defeat was, of course, primarily caused by someone who didn’t even run in the election. Namely, Donald Trump. Most of the people who had swept Trump into the White House with their votes in 2024 were probably not die-hard Trump supporters. They were simply fed up with the compromised liberal establishment under “Sleepy Joe” Biden. Trump had won his election comfortably. In addition, he had both houses of Congress behind him. And with the Heritage Foundation’s script, the “Project 2925,” he knew exactly what to do and when and where to do it this time. Trump, even more than his predecessors, represented a radical takeover of public offices by the super-rich and their devoted paladins. Unashamedly, the super-rich carried out their strange rituals, scandals, and corruptions right before our eyes. It quickly became clear that Trump and his associates were only interested in self-enrichment. It quickly became clear that the state and the institutions of the common good could not expect any leniency from the super-rich. It quickly became clear that the Trumpists were staging a civil war from above. Among other things, with their notorious foreign police, ICE.

Image: US Senate candidate for michigan Abdul El-Sayed meets voters at Michigan Technological University. October 22, 2025 (CC BY-SA 4.0)

He shamelessly plundered his MAGA fans with his Trump and Melania coin. He turned farmers against him when he casually announced that if domestic beef was too expensive, he could arrange for beef from Argentina at special rates through his vassal Milei. In the midterm elections, Trump preferred to intervene to defame opponents of the Democrats at the lowest level. The Senate candidate from Michigan, Abdul El-Sayed, is “connected to Hamas.” If Sayed wants to enter the Senate, he must first be scanned with metal detectors before being allowed in.

However, his recent appearances before the midterms can only be described as political suicide. On November 1, he gave a two-hour speech in Iowa to handpicked MAGA fans that was almost beyond comprehension. Largely incoherently, Trump babbled about the Vietnam War (”I would have ended it in a week!”), the overweight of a Republican candidate, anecdotes from his private life, and much more. He made some very strange contortions and seemed to fall asleep again and again. Then the grand finale. All major TV channels and YouTube channels were invited to Washington for November 2nd. The Great Chairman would give an incredibly important speech. Is Trump now firing his last bullet? Would he announce sensational things?

You think so? Not a chance. Trump ceremoniously opened an artificial lake in Washington that had been closed to the public for a long time. Now this lake has been professionally renovated and cleaned. Trump reported on the renewal of the water pipes, and that the new pipes were initially vandalized and had to be repaired again. Now everything is wonderful. The audience’s toenails curled in embarrassment. Trump had now definitively messed up the elections. When oligarchic detachment from reality corresponds with age-related mental decline, the consequences can sometimes be devastating[8].

All the more astonishing that Trump admitted his election defeat and even congratulated the Democrats on their success. However, he had already said before the election that if he lost Congress, he would only be “Mr. Veto” until the end of his term. Then he will mercilessly torpedo all legislative initiatives of Congress with his veto.

Is Everything Going to Be Alright Now?

Unfortunately not. Trump has, at times, dictatorial powers as president. For example, he is allowed to press the red button to launch an atomic bomb solely based on his own decision-making power. No other ruler in the world, no matter how autocratic, is allowed to do that. In this context, the news from the host Tucker Carlson is not very comforting, as insider reports suggest that Trump is indeed considering detonating a nuclear bomb on an Iranian mountain to crack an underground, imagined Iranian nuclear facility[9]. The outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would urge Trump to commit this act of madness.

At the same time, Trump might consider that the new Congress will not convene until next January. Maybe Trump can still etch himself into the history books with such an act by then? Let’s hope Trump doesn’t exploit the current power vacuum in this way.

Shortly before the election, Democratic Senator from Connecticut Chris Murphy was invited to the White House to be briefed on the Trump administration’s military plans. At a forum, he was asked about the briefing. Murphy was not allowed to disclose any details of his briefing. But visibly shaken, he only revealed that the plans for a new offensive against Iran were simply “insane.”[10] If that happens, the escalation in the region would be gigantic, and the rule of law would be a thing of the past. Shortly thereafter, Murphy collapsed with a stroke and is currently out of action.

But even if we emerge unscathed from the Trump era, there isn’t necessarily a reason to celebrate. If the Democrats were to indeed provide the next president starting in 2028, it would merely be a case of exchanging plague for cholera. Domestically, there might be a few treats for their own clientele. The terror troops of the ICE are likely to be tamed. Federal health subsidies would be paid out again. Otherwise, they are still exactly the same Democrats who were ousted from office by Trump in 2024. The Democrats still advocate for vaccinations, vaccinations until no doctor comes anymore. The Democrats have not subjected the Corona terror to a critical review to this day. The Democrats want to continue the whole charade of wokeness.

And the foreign policy of the Democrats is likely to become really dangerous for the Europeans again. Because then a continuous chain of command from Washington to Kyiv will once again be reestablished. Democrats, including the “democratic socialist” Bernie Sanders, remain passionate Russia haters for whom diplomatic dialog with Moscow is out of the question.

The geostrategic dividing line between Democrats and Republicans is as follows: the Democrats want to militarily defeat Russia, and then take on the final opponent, China. Toward Third World countries, the Democrats generally adopt a somewhat more tactful approach. The Democrats do not want to destroy Iran militarily, but rather gently bring it to its knees through economic sanctions.

In contrast, the Republicans want to buy off Russia and pull it out of the BRICS phalanx. For this, one can threaten and exploit Third World countries in an old colonial manner. For US citizens, neither option is acceptable. About two-thirds of all Americans do not like either the Democratic or the Republican Party[11]. They also do not trust the Political Action Committees that collect money from the super-rich and then strategically distribute it to the right politicians. Particularly hated recently is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) because it has exerted significant influence on Trump’s war against Iran[12]. The spotlight of public attention is now on the previously untroubled Israel lobbyists. AIPAC now says it wants to withdraw from financing and promoting politicians. The lobbying will be taken over by a new front organization, namely the United Democracy Project.

So everything continues as before, whether democratic or republican. The encouraging aspect of the development is that a significant number of Americans have seen through this game and no longer want to be treated this way. There have been such moments in the history of the USA. At the beginning of the twentieth century, such a popular uprising was contained by the Progressives under Theodore Roosevelt. After the crash of 1929, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was able to capture the popular uprising of that time in the New Deal.

Whether the current awakening can still be captured by a synthetic movement is to be doubted. Between the ordinary Americans and the super-rich, there are worlds apart. People want neither plague nor cholera. Maybe the Americans will finally find a Third Way. It is to be hoped for them.

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Hermann Ploppa is a political scientist and journalist. Ploppa recently published the book “Der Neue Feudalismus – Privatisierung, Blackrock, Plattformkapitalismus” (The New Feudalism – Privatization, Blackrock, Platform Capitalism). As Amazon does not yet stock the book, it is best to order it from the author at: liepsenverlag@gmail.com. Visit the author’s blog here.

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Notes

[1] https://time.com/article/2026/10/19/midterm-ad-spending-has-surpassed-10b-where-is-the-money-coming-from-/

[2] https://hermannploppa.substack.com/p/tech-oligarchs-fabricate-public-opinion?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web&embedding_publication_id=5734834

[3] https://qz.com/elon-musk-474-million-political-donations-midterms-110226?utm_source

[4] https://paidforpolitics.com/governors/oh?utm_source

[5] https://www.n-tv.de/politik/Amy-Acton-gewinnt-Ohio-Gouverneurswahl-gegen-Trump-Kandidat-id31492234.html

[6] https://www.n-tv.de/politik/Amy-Acton-gewinnt-Ohio-Gouverneurswahl-gegen-Trump-Kandidat-id31492234.html

[7] https://dashboard-production-c2fc.up.railway.app/?utm_source

[8] https://hermannploppa.substack.com/p/trump-stolpert-uber-seine-eigenen?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web&embedding_publication_id=5734834

[9] https://www.globalresearch.ca/tucker-says-trump-nuke-iran/5945045

[10] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9rmfC6I6x4

[11] https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2026/05/01/americans-continue-to-view-both-the-republican-and-democratic-parties-negatively/

[12] https://apnorc.org/projects/few-jewish-adults-feel-supported-by-the-major-political-parties-or-the-president/?utm_source

Featured image is from the author

Europe and America’s Dystopian Nightmare Must End Now

 

Why Europe is crumbling and what it means for America

By Helena Glass

Global Research, November 04, 2026

Region: Europe, USA

Theme: Global Economy, Politics

Europe’s capitalist economy is failing.

Having never fully recovered economically after the pandemic, European governments mismanaged growth in exchange for more war participation particularly in Ukraine and Sudan while losing control of their colonial states in Africa which was based on piracy. This piracy model is exactly what Trump is utilizing.

Africa prefers the China model of building vs. destroying.

Today that model is on display as China courts the Middle East.

Recent meetings include with foreign ministers from Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Iran.

China supports sovereignty and peace, driving a stable economy that is only slightly impacted by America’s tariffs and sanctions.

America ‘punishes’ while China ‘builds’.

 America defrauds while China builds. And thus, China is the number one enemy.

Neither Soros nor Rothschild has any impact on China because China’s banks are all state-owned – interest rates are low and fixed, corruption and fraud are not tolerated at all and consequences are severe.

The US government by contrast is corrupted to its core and no consequences means they just grow bolder and defraud more.

The America Bank is actually empty. The gold is likely a scam. Manipulated stock trades are common. And if a fraudster faces prison they can buy their way out.

There are ten countries that have not succumbed to the Rothschild Banking Cartel; China, Russia, Syria, Vatican City, Japan, Somalia, Cuba, Iran, Somalia and Bolivia.

Israel is courting Japan and Syria while the US is bombing Cuba, Iran, and Somalia.

China and Russia are too big to cave. Leaving Bolivia and ‘Vatican City’ the only potential conquests.

While Vatican City does not have a Rothschild Bank per se, the Vatican has routinely turned to the Rothschild’s for bailouts:

Napoleon Wars 1832 – severe financial strains from the war caused Pope Gregory XVI to turn to the Rothschild’s for loans aggregating lbs400,000. James Meyer de Rothschild thus became the official papal banker. 1850’s Pope Pius IX asked again for a loan which was granted.

Institute For The Works of Religion 1942 – founded by Pope Pius XII, the Institute is labeled as Vatican Bank, but it is run by The Rothschild’s. Current President is Francois Pauly who previously was a senior executive at Edmond de Rothschild Group. Other positions include at Sal. Oppenheim, whose founder’s son married into the Rothschild family. All of which indicates that the Vatican is controlled by the Jewish Banking Cartel.

According to the Torah and the Hebrew Bible, the Apostles and Jesus were Jewish.

The evidence to support this is a circular which also claims Catholicism is a form of Judaism.

A reminder; the oldest surviving Torah is dated from the 13th century AD.

The oldest surviving The Sassoon Codex Hebrew Bible, nearly complete, is dated from the 10th century AD utilizing carbon dating.

The carbon dating was done by Jacob Eli Safra sometime in the late 20th century. A descendant of a Syrian Jewish banking family, Safra is in the ‘film industry.’ He bought this Codex which is bound in 20th century leather at an estate sale. Its previous owner was David Solomon Sassoon who was born in India in 1880. He also owned the Aleppo Codex which was carbon dated to the 14th century. Safra also owns Encyclopedia Britannica.

According to the Liber Pontificals, dating from the 8th and 9th centuries via carbon methods, four Popes were Jewish. The last in the 11th century. The Liber authors are all anonymous. Yet it is used in the argument that essentially Catholicism is Judaism. Jesus was a Jew. And nearly all original manuscripts of history somehow crossed the hands of Jewish bankers.

Western society is built upon false historical content. The culture, the ethics, the morality of false ideologies is unsustainable. It is a castle built on sand. The wave that destroyed it is called ‘the internet’. The ‘internet’ opened the availability of information to be critically analyzed, which opened holes in narratives that had become too vast to fill. Today, Palantir’s AI is attempting to fill those holes so that the next generation is fully indoctrinated.

Europe’s children are protesting that indoctrination as the old school Von der Leyen’s vociferously try and keep the fraud from being completely revealed.

They are losing the battle. The Black Bloc sent in to disrupt the protests and denigrate the students has already betrayed the narrative via the Internet with truth. Students want to be educated and are instead being degraded wherein knowledge is replaced with propaganda. Where truth and expert and science no longer exist.

The Old Guard of Europe is desperately trying to hold to the fakery that is coveted by evil because evil served them well. They no longer pretend to represent the people. Any more than America’s various governments. It was always about a means of self-enrichment and placating the people with a carrot or two. Only the carrots dried up and became inedible – and now we must do what must be done to right the wrongs so as to dig ourselves out of this dystopian nightmare.

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Helena Glass is Former CPA & Series 7, with emphasis in Real Estate and Financial Planning. Two brains in one: former Bronze Sculpter and Danseuse. Visit the author’s blog. 

She is a regular contributor to Global Research.