How much money does the United States give Israel every year?
Executive summary
The United States currently provides Israel roughly $3.8 billion in predictable annual security assistance under a 10‑year Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that runs through 2028 — composed of $3.3 billion in Foreign Military Financing (FMF) plus about $500 million for cooperative missile‑defense programs — though emergency transfers and additional weapons drawdowns have pushed annual totals far higher in recent years [1] [2]. Different sources and accounting methods produce different headline figures: some emphasize a longer historical average near $3 billion, others the $3.8 billion MOU floor, and still others highlight one‑time surges tied to specific conflicts [3] [4] [5].
1. What the headline number means: the $3.8 billion MOU floor
The most commonly cited annual figure — $3.8 billion — reflects the Obama‑era 10‑year security MOU formalized in U.S. government practice as $3.3 billion in FMF plus $500 million earmarked for cooperative missile‑defense programs such as Iron Dome and David’s Sling; this is the baseline the State Department and multiple outlets use to describe steady U.S. assistance through 2028 [1] [2]. That $3.8 billion is primarily military in nature and is intended for procurement of U.S. defense articles and services, not direct budgetary support.
2. Why other tallies differ: averages, histories and what is counted
Longer‑term averages and different definitions shift the number: advocacy and historical summaries note an average closer to $3 billion annually since 1985 when economic aid declined and military assistance grew, while data aggregators and historical accounts point to hundreds of billions in cumulative aid since Israel’s founding, producing different per‑year impressions depending on whether inflation, missile‑defense funding, or emergency transfers are counted [3] [6] [7]. Some analysts also separate FMF grants from additional DoD missile‑defense spending and emergency drawdowns — causing legitimate but confusing variation in reporting [1] [6].
3. The recent spike: emergency aid, drawdowns and record yearly totals
Since the October 7, 2023 attacks and ensuing Gaza war, the United States has approved far more than the MOU baseline in one‑off security commitments and drawdowns from stockpiles; Brown University’s Costs of War project and mainstream outlets report roughly $17.9 billion in military aid approved since that date and calculate total related U.S. spending in the region in the tens of billions for the 2023–24 period — a level that dwarfs the $3.8 billion annual baseline for that wartime year [5] [2] [8]. Other reporting finds $6.8 billion in FMF delivered between October 2023 and September 2024, illustrating how crisis spending can quadruple or more the usual yearly flows [9].
4. Political context and competing agendas that shape the numbers
The $3.8 billion figure is politically potent: supporters frame it as a predictable, treaty‑adjacent commitment essential to regional deterrence and U.S. defense industry ties, while critics question giving large military grants to a wealthy, arms‑exporting state and push for rethinking the MOU as it approaches expiration in 2028 — a debate reflected in Israeli leaders publicly signaling eventual Israeli self‑reliance and in U.S. domestic partisan fault lines [4] [10]. Different sources advance different emphases — government statements underscore the missile‑defense cooperation [1], advocacy groups stress broader historical totals and lack of accounting [3], and research centers highlight emergency wartime surges [5].
5. Limitations and what the sources do not settle
Open reporting and official documents explain the principal components of annual assistance but do not eliminate ambiguity: some databases exclude certain Defense Department missile‑defense outlays, emergency drawdowns, or classified systems, meaning headline totals can understate or omit components depending on method [6] [11]. The available sources clearly establish that the steady pre‑crisis commitment is about $3.8 billion a year, while also documenting that actual U.S. spending to support Israeli operations can spike dramatically during crises.