The United States and Israel have reached a final agreement on a new military assistance program worth $ 38 billion over the next ten years. The current memorandum, set at $ 3 billion a year, will expire in 2018.
Israel was asking for military aid with a budget adjusted to 4 / 4,5 billion dollars a year. The agreement was reached on the basis of 3,8 billion dollars per year. The new MOU, Memorandum of understanding, it will be signed within the next few days. The Obama administration was pressing to cement a new ten-year agreement with Israel before the end of the mandate, especially after reaching a nuclear deal with Iran, strongly opposed by Jerusalem.
It is the most expensive military assistance program ever funded by the United States. In the new Memorandum of understanding, Israel agrees not to request additional funds from Congress before the natural expiration of the contract. Israel will also gradually renounce various concessions in both the industrial and economic fields.
The agreement reached by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who disagrees with Obama for both Iran and the Palestinians, allows him to avoid the uncertainties of the next president. For the first time, the new package will incorporate Israeli missile defense money which, until now, was funded separately by Congress.
The United States jointly developed or funded all three levels of Israel's missile defense: Iron Dome (short range), David's Sling (medium range) ed Arrow (long range) for a total cost of over 600 million dollars. In the last shopping list presented last November, Israel also asked for a new squadron of F-15s and between twelve and twenty V-22s Osprey (photo). For F-15Is equipped with AESA radar, the total cost of the operation is estimated at ten billion dollars.
The V-22, already requested in 2012, would be used for the infiltration and exfiltration of special units in Iranian territory.
(photo: US Marine Corps)
