Topic: GeopoliticsBlog Brand: Middle East WatchRegion: Middle EastTags: Benjamin Netanyahu, Donald Trump, Isolationism, Israel, Special Relationship, and United StatesIsrael Is Growing More Dependent on a Less Sympathetic United States July 1, 2025By: Leon HadarShareShare this link on FacebookShare this page on X (Twitter)Share this link on LinkedInEmail a link to this pageThe longtime pro-Israel bipartisan consensus in American politics is fading—precisely at the moment Israel needs it most.It has become a worn trope among anti-Semitic political commentators that the United States regularly sends its soldiers to “die for Israel.” Yet while Israel has relied on generous US military assistance throughout the years, providing access to the most advanced and cutting-edge weaponry and technologies, no American soldier has directly fought on its behalf since its founding in 1948. During his initial tenure as Prime Minister in the 1970s, Yitzhak Rabin was the first Israeli leader to explicitly lay out a policy of never asking the United States for combat forces—an approach that all subsequent Prime Ministers have maintained.The United States and Israel have held joint military exercises, cooperated closely on missile defense, jointly developed and tested new weapons systems, shared intelligence, and consulted on strategy. However, Israel has never requested American boots on the ground, beyond advisers and auxiliary units. Instead, the United States has provided extensive military aid to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), justified by the argument that the IDF functions as an unsinkable American “aircraft carrier” in the Middle East—a substitute for a permanent military deployment like those in Germany, South Korea, Japan, or Qatar.When Israel has come under assault, Americans have sometimes aided in its defense—as during the missile exchanges in 2024, when US Air Force pilots helped to shoot down Iranian rockets targeting Israeli cities and military bases. Earlier in June, however, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went a step further: breaking the longstanding taboo that Rabin established, he requested not only defensive support from the United States, but for American pilots and planes to bomb Iran’s nuclear uranium sites. “For the first time, Israel is asking America to fight alongside it, or for it,” as Israel’s Haaretz editor Aluf Benn put it. In Benn’s view, the mission in question was too big for the IDF alone—and represented an “unprecedented peak” in Israel’s dependence on the United States.To the alarm of some in Jerusalem, however, Israel’s dependency on America is increasing at the same time that demographic and political changes in America are gradually creating pressures to lessen the ties between the two nations.For much of Israel’s existence, American public life was dominated by the generation that witnessed, or grew up shortly after, the Second World War—when the trauma of the Holocaust and Israel’s war for existence played a central role in the political and media agenda. But this generation is beginning to leave the stage. It is being replaced by a generation whose ties with the Jewish community and attitude toward Israel are far more ambivalent. The aging Democratic Party establishment, which has been the political home of American Jews since the early 20th century, has supported liberal values that have enabled Jews to reach positions of power and influence in the political system. At the same time, however, the Democratic Party is becoming the home of black, Hispanic, and Muslim activists. These groups are gradually becoming the electoral base of the party, making it less dependent on support from liberal Jews, whose numbers are shrinking.These and other groups—particularly left-wing progressives—tend to see Israel as a Western outpost in the Third World. They are suspicious of it, based on the view that it oppresses the native-born Palestinian population and is supported by the remnants of the white establishment in both US parties.At the same time, the Republican Party, while nominally sympathetic to Israel, is acquiring a more populist and isolationist tint, and pro-Israeli Republican hawks and neoconservative intellectuals are losing their power to dictate the foreign policy agenda of the party.Pro-Israel Evangelical Christians continue to be part of the electoral base of the GOP. But the fierce debate within the MAGA movement over the wisdom of US intervention in the recent Iran-Israel war demonstrated the increasing influence of those in the Republican Party—including Vice President JD Vance—who back a non-interventionist foreign policy agenda and insist that American and Israeli strategic interests are not always aligned. The isolationist movement within the Republican Party argues that Washington needs to adopt a certain benign neglect with regard to Israel—perhaps supporting it through rhetoric or through UN votes, but dramatically scaling back meaningful security assistance and spending the money saved in ways that directly benefit the American people.In short, the traditionally pro-Israeli foreign policy elites in the two major political parties are leaving the stage. This reality will catch up with America’s policy towards Israel, just as the Jewish state’s reliance on, and need for, American support is reaching new heights.About the Author: Leon HadarDr. Leon Hadar is a contributing editor with The National Interest, a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI) in Philadelphia, and a former research fellow in foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute. He has taught at American University in Washington, DC, and the University of Maryland, College Park. A columnist and blogger with Haaretz (Israel) and Washington correspondent for the Business Times of Singapore, he is a former United Nations bureau chief for the Jerusalem Post.Image: Wikimedia Commons.The post Israel Is Growing More Dependent on a Less Sympathetic United States appeared first on The National Interest.