The United States Should Stop Giving Military Aid to Israel

I am quite busy as well, so my round 3 will be brief as well. Thanks to Con for the argument. I will first address Con's grounds for Israeli support. C1. Morally Correct Purely using the fact that Israel and the United States are both democratic countries is not a justification for support, just as liberals blindly funding other liberal groups just because of the tag of "liberal" (and the same for conservatives). It is true that both nations rose out of oppression of both the religious and political kind, but neither country is in that situation any more - in fact, they are now the oppressors (see the United States is Afghanistan and Iraq and Israel in Lebanon, Iran, and the Gaza Strip). And while Israel has formed a democracy that its own people thrive under, the military decisions made by the leaders of the IDF and IAF create harsh conditions for the civilians living around such a country. Israel is more than "holding out" against these Islamic extremists. The terrorist groups are nowhere close to as organized as Israel's military is, and unlike these rebelling factions, the Israeli military has the capability (which it has used in the past) to wipe out terror leaders, often taking out many civilians in the process. Here's where the cost-benefit analysis comes in. If we withdraw aid to Israel, we would have billions of dollars free to re-invest into the global economy, perhaps even using some for humanitarian aid to set up shelters for those affected by Israel's actions while halting our sponsorship of Israeli military violence. Israel is more than capable of defending against any attacks, even without American military aid and weapons (some of which Israel has convinced the United States to remove records of in order to provide Israel with a clean slate of untraceable weaponry, often used in Mossad's undercover assassinations). While Israel is an asset to American intelligence, the United States has been significantly increasing recon in the Middle East independently of Israel. Soon, the United States will not have to rely on Israel for information and will be able to get it directly. CII. Advances US Strategic Interests The United States is not in need of any sort of military support. Unless the United States takes some crazy drastic measure to undermine Israeli power by transferring aid to terrorist groups and bombing Israel, Israel will support the United States regardless. The United States has conducted surveillance in Israel for years (as has Israel in the United States), but this spying has not created any tension. There is no valid reason to believe that Israel would suddenly turn against the United States if military aid were pulled. And as for strategic interests, see my comment referring to the expansion of U.S. Middle East programs mentioned above. CIII. Advances US Economic Interests Your statements regarding Israel investing in American industries is less true than you think. According to Jeremy M. Sharp of the Congressional Research Service [1], Israel uses loopholes in the military aid agreement to buy arms from Israeli manufacturers instead of American ones to boost its own economy. It also influenced passage of H.R. 938 (S. 462), a bill that exempted Israel from obtaining permission from the United States to sell American-made technology and weaponry to third-party dealers, giving Israel extreme leeway with the aid given to it. Essentially, Israel can use American money to buy Israeli weapons, and the technology actually bought from the United States can be resold and spread around the world without the United States' consent. American business is not benefitting from this as much as one would like to think. Here, I will begin a new sub-argument. The aid sent to Israel is often used for terror purposes rather than defense. Mossad, in order to stop Iran from developing nuclear technology, has consistently assassinated high-profile nuclear physicists. (Don't get me wrong - I believe that Iran should not develop nuclear technology as well, but this is a criticism of Israeli methods.) Tactical preventative assassinations are rampant in Israeli forces, according to Edward H. Kaplan of Yale, Alex Mintz of Texas A&M, and Shaul Mishal of Tel Aviv University [2]. Since this has not been extremely effective, Israel's tactic seems to be scaring other scientists from working on Iran's program by attacking physicists unrelated to the nuclear program, like Tehran University's Masoud Ali Mohammadi. [3] In fact, these killings have gotten so out of hand that the United States itself is criticizing Israel's assassinations (but, of course, isn't acting on these criticisms at all) [4]. But the study by the three men in source 2 have found that preemptive arrests, rather than assassinations, have kept Israel safer, as assassinations have spurred more anti-Israeli violence in the months following a killing. Israel's government is smart; they undoubtedly know of these studies. But the fact that they refuse to change their behavior after knowing this shows a tendency to violence, which is why the United States should stop supporting Israel financially and facilitating its actions even further. A theory first suggested by Kirsten E. Schulze of Indiana University [5] shows that Israel isn't quite in conscious control of its military actions. The study suggests that Israel's leaders are victims of a "groupthink," in which each member is more concerned with creating harmony within the leadership environment than with the consequences of their actions; this causes them to shut out all alternative solutions and stick to the one that pleases the id the most (essentially peer pressure at a highly meta level). The direct effect of this is shown in Israel's long list of assassinations, collateral damage, and morally ambiguous tactics, supporting the straightforward, internally united actions of the Israeli government. The United States should not be funding a country that goes forward so blindly with such disregard to foreign human life and should immediately withdraw aid from Israel. [1] - http://www.jstor.org... [2] - http://www.jstor.org... [3] - http://www.spiegel.de... [4] - http://www.cbsnews.com... [5] - http://www.jstor.org...