A top aide to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton laid out in unusual detail Friday what he called the Obama administration’s unprecedented security assistance to the Jewish state.



“Our security relationship with Israel is broader, deeper and more intense than ever before," Assistant Secretary of State for Political Military Affairs Andrew Shapiro told the Brookings Institution on Friday.



Shapiro said the Obama administration would honor a 2007 commitment to provide Israel $30 billion in security assistance during the next 10 years. Israel is the largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid.



The U.S. also gives Israel something it does not give to any other beneficiary of U.S. foreign military financing, Shapiro said.



“Unlike other beneficiaries of Foreign Military Financing, which are legally required to spend funds in the United States, Israel is the only country authorized to set aside one-quarter of its FMF funding for off-shore procurements,” Shapiro said.



The Obama administration is also continuing to commit itself to preserve Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge — “its ability to counter and defeat credible military threats from any individual state, coalition of states, or non-state actor, while sustaining minimal damages or casualties,” as Shapiro defined it.



That also means that the U.S. will sell Israel sophisticated defense equipment that it will deny to other U.S. allies in the region.



“This means that as a matter of policy, we will not proceed with any release of military equipment or services that may pose a risk to allies or contribute to regional insecurity in the Middle East," Shapiro said.

In addition to $2.75 billion in U.S. foreign assistance to Israel in 2010 and $3 billion in 2011, the Obama administration has requested that Congress approve $205 million in U.S. funds to support production of Iron Dome, an Israeli-developed short-range rocket defense system.

comments closed

permalink