While Americans argue over rent hikes, groceries, and student loans, Israel has extracted $124 M per day from the U.S. Treasury for an entire year, much of it hidden behind opaque appropriations and congressional loopholes.
According to Brown University’s Costs of War project, Washington has shouldered 70% of Israel’s military costs since Oct 7, 2023. That includes $17.9 B in direct aid, $4.86 B in Pentagon regional ops, $20.3 B in deferred arms deals, and billions more in shipping losses, stockpile transfers, and corporate handouts.
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According to Brown University’s Costs of War project, Washington has shouldered 70% of Israel’s military costs since Oct 7, 2023. That includes $17.9 B in direct aid, $4.86 B in Pentagon regional ops, $20.3 B in deferred arms deals, and billions more in shipping losses, stockpile transfers, and corporate handouts.
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Since 1948 the United States has pumped $317 B into Israel, including $251.2 B in military aid since 1959; that torrent began with the first Pentagon loan in 1959, switched to grants in 1974, became 100% grants in 1985, and now flows automatically as a $3.8 B lump-sum every Oct 1 plus a $500 M missile-defense kicker under the 2019-2028 MOU, money on which Israel pockets the interest because Washington lets it sit in a Fed account. Even so, FY-2024 set a new single-year record: $17.9 B, dwarfing the 1973 and 1978 surges and landing entirely on U.S. taxpayers.
That FY-2024 fire-hose breaks down as $6.8 B Foreign Military Financing, $4.5 B for Iron Dome and David’s Sling reloads, $1.2 B for the Iron Beam laser, $1 B to crank out more 155 mm shells in U.S. factories, and $4.4 B to refill Pentagon stockpiles stripped for Israeli use, again, $17.9 B in 11 months. The administration also slid at least 100 separate weapons deals under congressional reporting thresholds to keep the true cost opaque.
That FY-2024 fire-hose breaks down as $6.8 B Foreign Military Financing, $4.5 B for Iron Dome and David’s Sling reloads, $1.2 B for the Iron Beam laser, $1 B to crank out more 155 mm shells in U.S. factories, and $4.4 B to refill Pentagon stockpiles stripped for Israeli use, again, $17.9 B in 11 months. The administration also slid at least 100 separate weapons deals under congressional reporting thresholds to keep the true cost opaque.
Hardware deliveries since Oct 7 2023 read like a warehouse manifest: 57 000 155 mm shells; 36 000 30 mm cannon rounds; 22 800 aerial bombs (14 100 Mk-84 2 000-lb and 8 700 Mk-82 500-lb); 13 981 anti-tank missiles; 3 000 JDAM kits; 2 600 250-lb small-diameter bombs; 3 500 night-vision devices; 2 000 Switchblade-600 loitering drones; more than 100 Skydio X drones; 75 JLTV armored trucks; and 4 127 000 kg of JP-8 jet fuel. In parallel, 600 open Foreign Military Sales cases worth $23 B march through the pipeline.
On 8-13-2024 Washington promised another $20.3 B: 50 F-15EX fighters priced at $18.8 B for delivery in 2029, 32 000 120 mm tank rounds at $774 M, $583 M in tactical vehicles, 30 AMRAAMs at $102 M, and 50 000 mortar bombs at $61 M, all deferred to future U.S. budgets via Israel’s “cash-flow” privilege.
On 8-13-2024 Washington promised another $20.3 B: 50 F-15EX fighters priced at $18.8 B for delivery in 2029, 32 000 120 mm tank rounds at $774 M, $583 M in tactical vehicles, 30 AMRAAMs at $102 M, and 50 000 mortar bombs at $61 M, all deferred to future U.S. budgets via Israel’s “cash-flow” privilege.
The Pentagon’s own meter is spinning in the Red Sea. CENTCOM has logged 217 Houthi-related incidents, forcing two carrier strike groups and an amphibious ready group into the theater. 1 CSG burns $8.7 M every day, $2.7 B per year, so the navy blew through the $2.4 B Israel supplemental passed in April and had fired $1 B in missiles by June; regional operations already cost $4.86 B, and planners admit the bill will hit $7–9 B if today’s tempo holds. Add $55–70 M in combat-zone pay and the 8-figure tax break that goes with it. Personnel jumped from 34 000 to a steady 40 000, peaking at 50 000 in Aug 2024, while CENTCOM contractors climbed to 20 591.
Collateral damage spills into world trade: since Nov 2023 roughly 60 % of Suez traffic detours around the Cape of Good Hope, adding 10 days and $300 000 in fuel per voyage while war-risk insurance tops $1 M. Weekly transits collapsed from 200–300 to 40–75, hammering shippers for at least $2.1 B so far and gutting Egypt’s canal revenue.
Collateral damage spills into world trade: since Nov 2023 roughly 60 % of Suez traffic detours around the Cape of Good Hope, adding 10 days and $300 000 in fuel per voyage while war-risk insurance tops $1 M. Weekly transits collapsed from 200–300 to 40–75, hammering shippers for at least $2.1 B so far and gutting Egypt’s canal revenue.
Meanwhile the money flows back to the usual corporate feeders. 60 % of the $14 B April supplemental, $8.4 B, went straight to U.S. arms firms. Boeing’s defense arm booked $8 B in Q4-2023 orders, 36 % of its annual revenue. The Financial Times projects $52 B in free cash flow for the top-15 defense contractors in 2026, $26 B pocketed by the U.S. “big five,” cash they historically plow into buybacks and dividends. Israel still may divert 25 % of each yearly grant, $950 M this cycle, to its own industry before that carve-out expires in 2028.
Add it up and the past 12 months have drained $17.9 B in direct aid, $20.3 B in new contractual obligations, $4.86 B (and climbing) in Pentagon regional costs, and $2.1 B in trade losses, a $45.16 B extraction. That works out to $124 M every day, $1.5 M every hour, funneled from American households to a foreign military and a handful of weapons conglomerates that treat the U.S. Treasury like an open vein.
Add it up and the past 12 months have drained $17.9 B in direct aid, $20.3 B in new contractual obligations, $4.86 B (and climbing) in Pentagon regional costs, and $2.1 B in trade losses, a $45.16 B extraction. That works out to $124 M every day, $1.5 M every hour, funneled from American households to a foreign military and a handful of weapons conglomerates that treat the U.S. Treasury like an open vein.
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