The United States has spent at least $17.9 billion in military aid to Israel since the Gaza war began and conflicts around the Middle East escalated, according to a report from Brown University’s War Costs Project released on Gaza Memorial Day. There is. Attack on Israel by Hamas.
Since the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks, an additional $4.86 billion has been poured into ramping up U.S. military operations in the region, according to findings provided by researchers for the first time to The Associated Press. This includes the cost of a navy-led campaign to quell strikes on commercial ships by Yemen’s Houthis, which it is carrying out in solidarity with fellow Iranian-backed group Hamas.
The report was completed before Israel opened a second front against Iranian-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon in late September, and comes as the Biden administration supports Israel in conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon. One of the first tallies of estimated costs in the United States. It aims to contain hostilities by Iranian-allied armed groups in the region.
In addition to the cost of human life, the economic damage is also significant. Hamas militants killed more than 1,200 people and took others hostage in Israel a year ago. Israel’s retaliatory attacks have killed around 42,000 people in the Gaza Strip, according to the Gaza Strip Health Ministry, which does not count civilians and fighters separately.
At least 1,400 people have been killed in Lebanon, including Hezbollah fighters and civilians, since Israel significantly escalated its attacks there in late September.
The financial cost was determined by Linda J. Bilmes, a professor at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and fellow researcher William D. Calculated by Hartung and colleagues. Steven Semler.
Let’s take a look at where some of the US taxpayers’ money has gone.
Record military aid to Israel
Israel, a protectorate of the United States since its founding in 1948, has received the largest amount of U.S. military aid in history, receiving $251.2 billion in inflation-adjusted dollars since 1959, the report said.
Still, the $17.9 billion (in inflation-adjusted dollars) disbursed since October 7, 2023, is by far the most military aid sent to Israel in a single year. The United States pledged to provide billions of dollars in military aid each year to Israel and Egypt when it signed the 1979 U.S.-brokered peace treaty, and the Obama administration has confirmed that it will provide Israel with no annual amount until 2028. This is the first agreement since the agreement was set at $3.8 billion.
U.S. aid since the start of the war in Gaza has included military funding, arms sales, the withdrawal of at least $4.4 billion from U.S. stockpiles and second-hand equipment.
Much of the U.S. weapons delivered that year were munitions, from artillery shells to 2,000-pound bunker busters to precision-guided bombs.
The study said the spending ranged from $4 billion to replenish Israel’s Iron Dome and David Thring missile defense systems to cashing in on rifles and jet fuel.
Unlike the U.S.’s publicly documented military aid to Ukraine, it was impossible to obtain full details of what the U.S. shipped to Israel since October 7 of last year, resulting in $17.9 billion for the year. is a partial figure, the researchers said.
They pointed out that the Biden administration is “attempting to conceal the total amount and type of aid through bureaucratic maneuvering.”
Funding for a major U.S. ally during a war that exacted heavy civilian casualties polarized Americans during the presidential campaign. But support for Israel has long been an important part of American politics, and Biden said Friday that “no administration has supported Israel more than I have.”
US military operations in the Middle East
The Biden administration has increased military forces in the region since the start of the Gaza war, with the aim of deterring and responding to any attacks on Israeli and American forces.
These additional operations will cost at least $4.86 billion and do not include increased U.S. military assistance to Egypt and other partners in the region, according to the report.
On the day Hamas broke through Israeli barricades around Gaza and attacked, the United States had 34,000 troops stationed in the Middle East. That number rose to about 50,000 in August, when two aircraft carriers were in port in the region to deter retaliation following an Israeli attack that killed Iranian Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh. increased in people. The number is currently approximately 43,000.
The number of U.S. ships and aircraft (carrier strike groups, amphibious readiness groups, fighter squadrons, and air defense forces) deployed in the Mediterranean, Red Sea, and Gulf of Aden fluctuates throughout the year.
The Pentagon said another carrier strike group is scheduled to head to Europe soon, and the total force could increase again if the two carriers are in the region at the same time again.
Fighting against the Houthis
U.S. forces have been deployed since the war began to counter escalating attacks by the Houthi rebels, who control Yemen’s capital and northern regions, and have been shelling commercial ships in the Red Sea in solidarity with Gaza. The researchers said the $4.86 billion cost to the United States is an “unexpectedly complex and asymmetrically expensive challenge.”
The Houthis continue to attack ships navigating key trade routes, provoking U.S. attacks on launch sites and other targets. The operation was the most intense running naval battle the Navy had faced since World War II.
“The United States deploys multiple aircraft carriers, destroyers, cruisers, and multimillion-dollar expensive missiles against cheap Iranian-made $2,000 Houthi drones,” the authors said.
Just Friday, U.S. forces struck more than a dozen Houthi targets in Yemen, striking weapons systems, bases and other equipment, officials announced.
The researchers’ calculations include at least $55 million in additional combat pay from stepped-up operations in the region.
(Except for the headline, this article has not been edited by Firstpost staff.)
