Trump says US aid to Israel will end this year, cutting off about $3.8 billion a year two years before the deal expires

President Donald Trump said on Tuesday, November 3, that the United States will stop its annual funding for Israel at the end of this year, ending payments of about $3.8 billion a year almost two years before the current agreement runs out. Speaking in a television interview on the morning of the US midterm elections, Trump said he and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had agreed this "months ago" and that Israel no longer needs the money.

Israel will still be able to buy American weapons, Trump said. Only the free funding would end.

What Israel receives now

The money comes from a memorandum of understanding signed in 2016, in the last months of Barack Obama's presidency. It promised Israel $38 billion over ten US fiscal years, from October 2018 to September 2028 — the largest military aid package Washington has ever agreed with any country.

Part of the 2016 agreement	Per year	Over 10 years
Foreign Military Financing (grants to buy US weapons)	$3.3 billion	$33 billion
Missile defence (Iron Dome, David's Sling, Arrow)	$500 million	$5 billion
Total	$3.8 billion	$38 billion
Years covered	FY2019 to FY2028 (ends September 30, 2028)

Trump repeatedly used the figure of $4 billion. When pressed on the exact amount, he said it could be defined "any way you want".

Can the White House end it early?

Trump did not say how the payments would be stopped. The aid is approved every year by Congress, which has broad support for Israel in both parties, and the memorandum itself is a political commitment rather than a law. Ending it early would most likely need Israel to formally give up the remaining money, or Congress to stop setting it aside in the budget. Neither has happened.

There is also no sign yet of what would replace it. Israeli officials have been preparing for talks on a new long-term security agreement with Washington. According to reports last year, Israel was seeking a 20-year deal that would move away from cash grants towards joint research, development and production of weapons — a model more in line with the "America First" approach.

Netanyahu's own plan to taper aid

The idea did not start with Trump. In an interview in January, Netanyahu said he wanted to reduce US military aid from $3.8 billion to zero over the next ten years, arguing that Israel's economy was strong enough to pay its own way. Days before Israel's general election on October 27, he told an Israeli television channel that the end of American aid was coming.

What Trump announced is far faster: an end within weeks, not a decade. Netanyahu's office did not comment immediately.

Israeli opposition attacks Netanyahu

Opposition politicians, still in coalition talks after the inconclusive election, turned on the prime minister. Yair Golan, leader of the left-wing Democrats, said ending American aid would deal a severe blow to Israel's security and called it another huge failure under Netanyahu's name. Avigdor Liberman, head of Yisrael Beiteinu, said $3.8 billion a year was the price Israel was paying for Trump's support for Netanyahu, who received Trump's public endorsement before the vote.

In Washington, critics of the president called the announcement election-day politics rather than a real policy change. Analysts noted that aid to Israel has become a divisive issue among younger voters in both parties since the Gaza war, and that Trump appeared to be trying to take it off the table.

What it means beyond Israel

The US funds are spent almost entirely on American-made weapons, so ending them would also hit US defence companies such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing and RTX, which supply Israel's F-35 and F-15 jets and its missile defences. Israel would have to cover those purchases from its own budget at a time when its defence spending is already at record levels after three years of war in Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen and Iran.

For the Middle East, the timing matters. The United States is carrying out strikes on Iranian positions around the Strait of Hormuz while mediators in Qatar try to agree a deal to reopen the waterway. Arab governments, including Pakistan's partners in the Gulf, will be watching whether a change in money also means a change in Washington's backing for Israeli military operations. Trump gave no sign of that, stressing that arms sales would continue.

What comes next

The next steps are in Congress, where the budget for the 2027 fiscal year is still being negotiated, and in Jerusalem, where Netanyahu is trying to form a new government. The first test will be whether the $3.3 billion in military financing is left out of the next defence spending bill, and whether Israel and the US open formal talks on an agreement to follow the one that expires in September 2028.