The special US-Israeli relationship that Benjamin Netanyahu’s government had counted on under the Donald Trump administration was, at first glance, not reflected in the updated US National Security Strategy. In reality, however, Washington appears to have proposed that its key Middle Eastern ally refocus its cooperation from geopolitical factors to geo-economic ones. However, Israel’s willingness to build cooperation in accordance with such a model remains questionable, writes Elizaveta Yakimova.
In the US National Security Strategy released this December, Israel is mentioned six times –twice fewer than Taiwan and twice more than Ukraine. This symbolic positioning largely reflects the country’s intermediate role within America’s shifting foreign policy framework.
Ukraine is described in the text not as an independent entity with which the White House hopes to develop a partnership, but rather as an instrument for stabilizing Europe. Taiwan, conversely, is positioned as a player that enhances the national security of not only the United States but also its allies, thereby justifying the American presence and increased defence spending in the region.
The Strategy, on the one hand, characterises Israel as a focal point for American peacekeeping efforts, including the Gaza conflict and the Abraham Accords. On the other hand, the country is recognised as capable of significantly influencing regional processes in a manner consistent with American priorities in the Middle East. Moreover, as the text suggests, the discussion is not limited to a 12-day war with Iran; it extends to the possibility of contributing, alongside the United States, “moderate” Arab regimes, and Turkey, to the stabilisation of Syria. It is noteworthy that in the first case, the effect was achieved through IDF activity, supported by the US Operation Midnight Hammer against Iranian nuclear facilities, while in the second, Washington, conversely, would like to see an end to Israeli military intervention in Syria.
However, despite receiving a relatively high assessment of the significance of its military activity, Israel, continuing the analogy with Taiwan, does not figure in the Strategy in relation to plans to transform the Middle East from a “potential source of impending catastrophe” into a “space of partnership, friendship, and investment,” despite the document explicitly declaring an interest in regional energy resources and technological advances, particularly in defence and artificial intelligence. The perception of an erosion of relations was exacerbated by the fact that the text specifically cites the Persian Gulf monarchies as examples of the United States’ most important allies.
In a global context, the US National Security Strategy demonstrated a shift from geopolitical to geo-economic partnership, for which Israel appears not yet ready. This is largely due to the Middle Eastern country’s own conceptual framework for ensuring national security, built on long-established principles, among which deterrence plays a central role. In its narrow military sense, deterrence entails conducting low-intensity combat operations, often pre-emptively, to prevent a full-blown armed conflict. In its broad sense, deterrence represents a kind of a closed system in which the economy helps to ensure military might, while a financially backed regional power advantage over adversaries is designed to protect economic life from the shocks that inevitably arise amid a prolonged and poorly controlled escalation.
Relations with the United States were built on a similar foundation, with American military aid becoming a constant pillar, guaranteeing the IDF’s qualitative military superiority over its neighbours’ armies. However, recently, the old model of cooperation has shown signs of transformation. Shortly before the publication of the conceptual document, the US president approved Saudi Arabia’s purchase of F-35 fighter jets, which previously only Israel had operated in the Middle East. Then, the National Security Strategy, only mentioned that the list of “primary interests” of the United States included the principle of “ensuring that Israel remains secure at all times,” excluding any specifics on how this state should be achieved.
These circumstances have sparked a new wave of debate in Israeli political and expert circles about the US penchant for leaving its allies in danger, similar in intensity to that seen during the failed Iraqi Kurdistan independence referendum in September 2017 and the announcement of the withdrawal of American troops from Syria in December 2018. Both events coincided with Donald Trump’s first presidential term. The ongoing debate on this issue has been exacerbated by the fact that, in contrast to the declarative intention to ensure that “Israel always remains secure,” Taiwan received very specific promises of American support for its defence capability in the updated Strategy.
The unspoken competition with Taipei is, to some extent, forcing Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to ignore signals from Washington, which is clearly trying to shift the focus of the partnership from the military-political to the financial-economic sphere. In fact, the Strategy clearly hints to Israel and the “moderate” Arab regimes that the Middle East can only replicate the experience of its Pacific allies in terms of security guarantees by developing its own undeniable economic, energy, and logistical advantages. Moreover, in the case of the Persian Gulf monarchies, the Strategy openly highlights their importance in terms of energy resources and maintaining freedom of navigation in the Red Sea. Israel, meanwhile, has yet to find its own niche, as neither the significance of Israel’s offshore gas fields, nor its contribution to the fight against the Yemeni Houthis, nor its previous achievements in high-tech development are included in the text, unlike Taiwan’s specific advantages.
The Trump administration has also proposed an outline of the path ahead for this key regional ally. One such step is the further expansion of the Abraham Accords, which, as stated in the Strategy, should encompass not only the Arab world but also the Muslim world. Moreover, the desire to shift the nature of normalisation from political to economic, while significantly expanding its geographic scope, has been encountered twice in the rhetoric of the American leadership recently. The first such statement was the US President’s announcement of Kazakhstan’s readiness to sign the Abraham Accords.
However, beyond foreign policy measures, Israel will need to rethink its approach to balancing economic development with military might in favour of the former. Moreover, the United States, it seems, has previously attempted to give the Israeli leadership a certain impetus in this direction. This was the case with the widely criticised “Middle East Riviera” plan, which in reality represented yet another attempt to implement the idea of “economic peace.” More broadly, this connects the current situation to the one that developed in Israel’s domestic political arena under the influence of the Oslo process, which was accompanied by a shift in government spending toward civilian needs. The White House seems to have come to expect something similar under the influence of the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
Overall, the United States is likely working to transform Israel from a geopolitical ally, which relies on military security guarantees, into a geo-economic one, that, through its position and connections within its own and neighbouring regions, would be able to apply not only military but also economic leverage, such as export controls or investment restrictions. Such a scenario would significantly change the rules of the game, as currently only Israel bears the consequences of such unfriendly actions, which is already clearly evident in its ties with Turkey and poses a risk to cooperation with the EU. Refusal to follow this path risks a very real erosion of the Middle Eastern country’s position in the system of American priorities, from the status of an exclusive partner to that of a player whose development assistance is necessary only in the context of maintaining regional stability.
