Donald Trump says US to ‘stop funding’ Israel

"They don’t need it. If they did need it, I would say ‘keep going,'" he told Fox News.

Ahead of the crucial United States midterm elections, where much is at stake for President Donald Trump, he announced that his country will “stop funding” Israel after the end of the year.

“Now, as far as paying Israel, Bibi Netanyahu and I have made a deal that we give Israel USD 4 billion ⁠a year, and ⁠we made a deal months ago that we’re stopping,” Trump told ⁠Fox News’ Fox and Friends after voting in the midterm elections began.

“We’ve ⁠already agreed that ⁠by the end of this year we won’t be paying Israel. ‌Now we’ll help Israel if they need it.”

The Republican says Israel doesn’t need the aid and it’s a lot of money for the US to spend. “Because they don’t need it. If they did need it, I would say ‘keep going,'” he said.

The United States has sent tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Israel over the last few years.

Trump also says that US aid to Israel has become a Democratic talking point for candidates such as Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed.

An academic study published last year showed the US under the administrations of President Joe Biden, a Democrat, and Trump provided at least USD 21.7 billion in military assistance to Israel after the start of the Gaza war in 2023.

The study was published on the second anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks in Israel that provoked the conflict.

Another study, also published last year by the Costs of War project at Brown University’s Watson School of International and Public Affairs, said the US had spent roughly USD 10 billion more on security aid and operations in the broader Middle East in the previous two years.

While the reports relied on open-source material for most of their findings, they offered some of the most comprehensive accounts of US military aid to close ally Israel and estimated costs of direct American military involvement in the Middle East.

On Tuesday, billboards across Tehran had a message for the US President – We will kill Trump.

It showed a sad-looking Donald Trump behind bars.

Another billboard nearby showed Trump along with US Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with bloodied faces and ragged suits against the background of worn-out Israeli and US flags.

The Iranian capital was flooded with demonstrators against Netanyahu and Trump, waving red flags and carrying placards reading: “There will be blood,” referring to a revenge killing of former supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who died in an airstrike on February 28, triggering the Middle East war.

In Tajrish Square in northern Tehran, an open-air exhibition featured paintings of Trump, including one showing him with his face lying bloodied on the ground as a foot presses down on his head.

A life-sized replica of a jail cell has remained on display, with an actor impersonating Trump spending the day inside. An adjacent screen showed images of the damage caused by US strikes on Iran.

(With inputs from Associated Press and Agence France-Presse)