How Much Does Israel’s War Cost the U.S.? Don’t Ask the State Department.

State Department spokesperson Matt Miller isn’t sure of much when it comes to Israel’s war on Gaza.

He doesn’t know how much military aid the U.S. has given to Israel during its war, even though his department oversees such assistance.

He doesn’t know how many billions of dollars, above the annual baseline of $3.3 billion in aid to Israel, have been appropriated in supplemental funding.

He knows additional money has been allocated but doesn’t know how much. “There are different ways of looking at it,” said Miller. 

The only thing Miller is sure of is that a new comprehensive report by the Costs of War Project at Brown University on U.S. spending on Israel’s military operations and related U.S operations is dead wrong.

A sophisticated analysis by the Costs of War Project tallied up at least $22.76 billion in military aid when combining approved U.S. security assistance to Israel since October 7, 2023; supplemental funding for regional operations; and estimated additional costs of operations, such as strikes against Houthi forces in Yemen. That figure includes $17.9 billion the U.S. government has approved in security assistance for Israeli military operations in Gaza and elsewhere since October 2023. This represents far more than any other year since the U.S. began providing military aid to Israel in 1959. In 2022, for example, the U.S. provided Israel with $5.1 billion in military aid.

Miller took exception to the report, including a price tag for U.S. Navy operations to defend maritime shipping from attacks by Houthi militants in Yemen: $4.86 billion and counting. It “conflates a number of things, including direct U.S. military spending to combat the Houthis attacking international shipping, which is included in that number, which is obviously not aid to Israel,” said Miller.

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William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and one of the co-authors of the Costs of War report, says the analysis contains such information precisely because the costs of the war have been so opaque. 

“The State Department spokesman is correct that our analysis conflates a number of different drivers of the cost of U.S. military support for Israel and our escalating role in the region. That was the point — to show how much taxpayers are providing in support of a deeply misguided policy to continue arming Israel even as it commits war crimes that some experts believe can plausibly be called a genocide,” Hartung told The Intercept. “It was telling that the State Department spokesperson critiqued our estimate — unfairly, we believe — but could not answer the question of how much the U.S. is spending in support of Israel’s Middle East wars. This kind of lack of transparency even as we are on the verge of possible direct involvement in the wars sparked by Israel’s actions since the invasion of Gaza is simply unacceptable.”

The State Department acknowledged questions from The Intercept about the Costs of War report, Miller’s comments, and the department’s own accounting of U.S. aid to Israel but did not respond to them prior to publication. 

U.S. weapons deliveries to Israel since October 7, 2023, include 57,000 artillery shells; 36,000 rounds of cannon ammunition; 20,000 M4A1 rifles; and 13,981 anti-tank missiles. 

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Biden Is Bankrolling Israel’s War Amid Growing Financial Hardship at Home

“Make no mistake, the United States is fully, fully, fully supportive of Israel,” said President Joe Biden recently, despite the fact that his administration acknowledged the likelihood that Israel has used U.S. weapons in Gaza in violation of international law.

In August, the Biden administration approved five major arms sales to Israel, including 50 F-15 fighter aircraft, tank ammunition, tactical vehicles, air-to-air missiles, and 50,000 mortar rounds, among other equipment totaling more than $20 billion. These sales are currently up for debate in Congress.

“We are careful to segregate out the $20 billion in arms offers that are currently under challenge in Congress — they are not part of our estimate of costs, or of arms transfers definitely destined for Israel,” Hartung emphasized. “And we view the increased deployments and activities of the U.S. military in the region as being tied in the first instance to the chaos caused by Israel’s brutal war on Gaza.”