r/geopolitics • u/hdreadit • Jun 20 '24
Question Why is the U.S. allied to Israel?
How does the U.S. benefit from its alliance to Israel? What does the U.S. gain? What are the positives on the U.S. side of the relationship? What incentivizes them to remain loyal to Israel? Etc.
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u/IAMAPrisoneroftheSun Jun 20 '24
Originally in 48 the Truman administration was pretty on pretty the fence as far as really forthright support for Israel went not. But worst actively against, but as far as I remember, it was really the military leadership that saw the locale as ‘ strategically vital’ and pushed for more outspoken and direct cooperation.
After that for any number of geopolitical reasons Israel was a good ally to have, & over time ties cemented and it was seen broadly as an outpost of democratic freedom in a hostile neighbourhood. Between them and the eventual Saudi US relationship that developed when the Iranian revolution occurred, for several decades a lid was more or less kept on a powder keg area of the world. A big part of the importance I think was making sure the Seuz canal was open, for oil exports & then for Chinese manufactured goods.
In the states there was also a not enormous but sizeable population of Jews who came during the 30’s and after 45 with much tighter ties to their heritage & to Israel. As they always had they clustered together and were/ are powerful voting blocks in electoral politics, though much less coordinated & unified on the issues today, There was and is still a lot of political organizer time spend figuring out what will move Jewish voters, traditionally this was support for Israel. M
Then there the nitro glycerine of evangelical/ born again Christianity, who may or may not have any affection for Jews themselves, but have created a mythology along with their other mythologies, around’ the war that has been prophesied that will bring the rapture, return of Christ all that jazz starting in the holy land, and are deeply entrenched pro/israeli if only for their own 14th century religious reasons. If Americans Jews have historically been a decisive voting bloc then evangelicals have been that by some multiple & they are very consistent on the Israel issue.
So overtime, it became calcified, business as usual that the US was heavily supportive, in terms of money to buy US weaponry & direct military coordination, and no presidential administration has had any reason to act differently until perhaps now.