The second phase of President Trump’s fragile 20-point Gaza peace deal appears to have stalled. Implementation of the first phase of the peace plan was monitored by a contingent of high-ranking U.S. officials visiting Israel amid reports of escalating violence in Gaza that threatened to shatter the armistice. During his visit to Israel, Vice President Vance rebuffed the assertion that Israel is a “vassal” of the U.S. in response to criticisms from younger demographics regarding the unique U.S. – Israel relationship. Prime Minister Netanyahu dismissed any speculation that the relationship is anything but “an alliance of partners.” Yet Netanyahu’s calls for renewed aggression in Gaza is in direct contravention to the agenda of his ostensible partners in Washington. Once again, the U.S. must determine if this partnership is mutually beneficial or even a partnership at all. A sober analysis exposes an uncomfortable reality: “America First” is at odds with perennial support for Israel. In a crowded field of 2028 hopefuls, Vice President Vance can distinguish himself by demanding that Israel align with Washington and maintain the nascent Gaza peace deal.
Vice President Vance’s comments that Israel is not a U.S. “protectorate” betrays a subtle deceit. The notion that Israel is a partner on an equal footing is not grounded in reality. Since Israel’s founding, the Jewish state has been the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. economic and military aid. Notably, the data does not account for longstanding U.S. efforts to pacify the region for Israel’s benefit. Following the 1978 Camp David Accords, when Egypt normalized ties with Israel, the change in U.S. aid to Egypt was dramatic and has endured. Egypt remains a top recipient of U.S. aid. Similarly, in 1994, Jordan normalized ties with Israel and was rewarded with a rapid increase in U.S. aid in the billions.
Contemporarily, the U.S. spent billions in a misguided bombing campaign of Yemen in response to Houthi retaliations against Israel for their war in Gaza. During the Iran-Israel War in June, the U.S. was responsible for “almost half of all interceptions” defending Israel from Iran, resulting in the U.S. reportedly burning through about 25% of its THAAD missile interceptors. The U.S. is purportedly establishing a long-term military presence near Damascus to monitor a potential security pact between Syria and Israel. Furthermore, there are supposedly U.S. plans to build a large military base near Gaza that would cost the American taxpayer hundreds of millions.
Israel is dependent on American largess, American military resources deterring regional threats, and unreserved American diplomatic support. Without American guarantees, one wonders if Israel would be more amicable toward its neighbors. The U.S.’s unrestricted support of a pariah state carries a high monetary, military, and diplomatic price – why is the U.S. so willing to pay this price? With the immense amount of unrestricted aid granted to Israel over the past 80 years, it is not unreasonable to expect that the U.S. would have some leverage over Israel.
Instead, Israel seems licensed to undermine U.S. foreign policy objectives. Consider when Israel defied President Trump’s nuclear diplomacy with Iran and launched preemptive strikes. In June 2025, The New York Times highlighted how this deleterious dynamic might have been the incentive for an Israeli strike: “Israeli officials close to Mr. Netanyahu believe the U.S. would have no choice but to assist Israel militarily if Iran counterattacked.” Similarly, in September, Israel unilaterally bombed Qatar, a U.S. ally hosting the largest U.S. military base in the Middle East. The U.K., France, Saudi Arabia and myriad other nations criticized the bombing. Even President Trump said it does not advance “America’s goals.”
So, what does Israel do for the U.S. besides destroy its reputation by proxy? And why isn’t Israel treated as a client of the U.S.? The U.S. has a population of nearly 350 million, while Israel barely tops 10 million. The U.S. sports the largest GDP on the planet with a 30 trillion dollar economy while Israel doesn’t even have a one trillion dollar economy. The U.S. military arsenal boasts many aircraft carriers while Israel has none. Yet Israel’s relationship with the U.S. is not an “alliance of partners,” but one in which the U.S. is a junior associate supporting Israel, the senior partner. No other country in the world enjoys that type of fealty from the U.S.
In May 2024, then-Senator Vance delivered a speech at the Quincy Institute, and attempted to “put a pro-Israel spin on the America First worldview.” This was a fruitless endeavor requiring one to ignore that support for Israel often leads to the U.S. acting contrary to its own interests. President Trump recently declared that his Gaza peace deal would usher in a “historic dawn of a new Middle East.” But nothing feels new here. Israel continues to wage war in Gaza, killing Palestinians as they please, despite – or in spite of – the ceasefire. Concurrently, Vice President Vance, the political heir apparent, assures Americans that the U.S. doesn’t want a “client state” but “a partnership.” Given the asymmetry in the U.S. – Israel relationship, if Vice President Vance wants to secure the vote of his increasingly Israel skeptical base in 2028, he will need to choose between bringing Israel to heel or subordinating U.S. strategic objectives to Israel’s agenda – he cannot do both. The “America First” choice is clear.
Robert Torres Jr. is a JD candidate at the University of Connecticut School of Law and previously earned a BA with honors in Political Science from the University of Connecticut. He has written opinion pieces focused on foreign policy analysis that have been published in RealClearWorld, Newsweek, National Security Journal, Antiwar, and Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, among others.
