A version of this article appeared in The Washington Times' Daily Threat Status newsletter.
Click here to receive Threat Status directly to your inbox every business day. The United States has spent a record $17.9 billion on military aid to Israel since the war in Gaza began, contributing to an escalation of the Middle East conflict, according to a report from Brown University's Cost of War Project released Monday, the anniversary of Hamas' attack on Israel. Another $4.86 billion has flowed into stepped-up U.S. military operations in the region since the Oct. 7, 2023, attack, researchers said in their findings provided to The Associated Press for the first time. These include the cost of a navy-led campaign to quell attacks on commercial ships by Yemen's Houthis in solidarity with the Iran-backed Hamas group. To the economic costs are added human lives. A year ago, Hamas fighters killed more than 1,200 people in Israel and took others hostage. Israeli retaliatory attacks have killed about 42,000 people in the Gaza Strip, according to the Gaza Strip Ministry of Health, but the ministry does not count civilians and fighters separately. At least 1,400 people have been killed in Lebanon, including Hezbollah fighters and civilians, since Israel sharply escalated its attacks in Lebanon in late September. The financial costs were calculated by Linda J. Professor Bilmes and his colleagues William D. Hartung and Steven Semler of the Harvard John F. Kennedy School of Government calculated the total cost of America's wars since the attacks of September 11, 2001. Let's see where some of the American taxpayer's money has gone. Israel, America's son since its founding in 1948, is the largest recipient in the history of American military aid, having received $251.2 billion in inflation-adjusted amounts since 1959, according to the report. Still, the inflation-adjusted $17.9 billion disbursed since Oct. 7, 2023, is by far the most military aid Israel has received in a single year. When the U.S.-brokered peace treaty was signed in 1979, the U.S. committed to providing billions of dollars in military aid annually to Israel and Egypt. The Obama administration set the annual amount for Israel at $3.8 billion through 2028, and has since agreed to it. U.S. aid since the start of the Gaza war includes military funding, arms sales, the withdrawal of at least $4.4 billion from U.S. stockpiles, and the transfer of used equipment. Many of the U.S. weapons delivered this year have been munitions, ranging from artillery shells to 2,000-pound bunker busters and precision bombs. The spending ranges from $4 billion to upgrade Israel's Iron Dome and David Sling missile defense systems to money for guns and jet fuel, according to the study. Unlike publicly documented U.S. military aid to Ukraine, it's impossible to know the full details of what the U.S. has given Israel since Oct. 7 of last year. The researchers say the annual $17.9 billion is just a fraction of the total.
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