US funding for Israel’s Iron Dome air defence system used to enjoy bipartisan support. Not anymore.

JTA – A growing number of leading progressives in the United States, including the leading liberal pro-Israel lobby, have come out against continued American funding for Israel’s Iron Dome defence system. 

J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami on Sunday joined Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ro Khanna, along with Jewish Democratic congressional challenger Brad Lander, in opposing future budget earmarks for Israeli defence systems. 

Such funding was relatively uncontroversial in the past, as the Iron Dome rocket interceptor has drawn near-unanimous praise, including from some of the figures now opposing its US support, for its role in protecting Israeli civilians. As recently as September, a bill to approve Iron Dome supplemental funding passed in the House with only nine dissenting votes. 

Now, that consensus has shifted in the wake of the war in Gaza and the joint US-Israeli war on Iran – both of which are deeply unpopular, particularly among Democrats – even as the Iron Dome recently prevailed in a high-stakes test as Iran fired hundreds of ballistic missiles at Israeli targets. Some of the progressives now opposing Iron Dome funding are arguing that Israel doesn’t need the assistance. 

“With a per capita GDP [gross domestic product] higher than countries like the United Kingdom, France, and Japan, Israel is more than capable of paying for its own defence, just as America’s other wealthy allies already do,” Ben-Ami wrote on J Street’s blog on Sunday. “Why should American taxpayers continue to subsidise the defence budget of a prosperous ally, particularly at a time when the US faces its own significant fiscal pressures?” 

Ben-Ami said the US should continue to sell the Iron Dome and other defence systems to Israel. He also made the case that ending US support for the defence systems would be a boon for Israel. 

“Supporters of Israel – many raised on the vision that the Jewish people just want Israel to be treated like all other countries – should welcome the development,” Ben-Ami said. “The benefits of disproportionately large financial assistance today are outweighed by the damage to Israel when that financial support becomes a divisive wedge in American politics.” 

J Street’s online policy positions were updated this month to indicate that the group is now “calling for American financial subsidies to Israel’s military to be phased out” by 2028. The group says it still supports the Iron Dome. “Ending those financial subsidies does not mean the United States should cease selling Iron Dome to Israel, but Israel should pay for these systems.” 

Ocasio-Cortez, earlier this month, similarly argued that Israel could fund its own defence system. 

“Consistent with my voting record to date, I will not support Congress sending more taxpayer dollars and military aid to a government that consistently ignores international law and US law,” she wrote on social media. The New York representative, a “Squad” leader and potential 2028 presidential candidate, made her announcement at a local forum of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). 

In their arguments, Ben-Ami and Ocasio-Cortez are carving out a distinct lane from a different rallying cry popular with antizionists: that Israel should not have an Iron Dome because Palestinians lack an equivalent, or because the Iron Dome indirectly aids Israel’s bombing campaigns. 

Representatives Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib are among those who have argued in this vein, as has Jewish Voice for Peace and the DSA, which last year stated, “Along with other US-funded interceptor systems, the Iron Dome has emboldened Israel to invade or bomb no fewer than five different countries in the past two years.” 

Some close observers of the US-Israel relationship said turning the Iron Dome into a political bargaining chip was revealing of deeper prejudices along similar lines. 

“Iron Dome is a purely defensive system. It simply cannot be used to threaten, or harm, or retaliate. Its only use is to save lives,” Ron Hassner, the chair of Israel studies at the University of California-Berkeley, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA). 

“When people ask me whether antisemitism is antizionism I often use antizionist attacks on Iron Dome as an example to show that antizionism is worse than antisemitism,” he added. “Antisemites seek to harm Jews. Antizionists seek to stop Jews from defending themselves from harm.” 

Ilai Saltzman, a professor of Israel studies at the University of Maryland, told JTA he saw J Street’s position as “a bit more nuanced” and not as extreme as that of some lawmakers. 

“They are not calling for the ending of all US military aid to Israel,” Saltzman said of the group, pointing to another policy position in which J Street supports selling “short-range air and ballistic missile defence capabilities to Israel”. 

Instead, he believes J Street is seeking “to increase the oversight over Israel’s actions in general and the use of US-supported military capabilities in particular”. 

“They are saying that you can be American Jewish while maintaining a very critical view of the Israeli government, especially the current one, and that the connection between the US and Israel is important but cannot be beyond compliance with American values and law when it comes to the use of military force,” he said about J Street. 

Ocasio-Cortez’s shift on the Iron Dome was notable, as she has drawn criticism from the left in the past for not opposing Iron Dome funding. In addition to voting for the funding in September, she has voted against a measure, introduced by former Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, to cut funding, while voting “present” on a 2021 bill to fund the Iron Dome and other Israeli military capabilities. 

Her announcement touched off a new round of progressive candidates backing away from the Iron Dome. Khanna, a California congressman also considering a 2028 presidential run, is now also opposing funding for the defensive system, echoing the argument that Israel should be able to pay for it itself. 

“We should not be subsidising them, especially given their egregious violations of human rights law,” he said. 

Congressional candidates in closely watched primaries are also saying they will oppose Iron Dome funding, notably including Lander, the Jewish former New York City Comptroller running against Jewish New York Representative Dan Goldman. (J Street’s political action committee has endorsed Goldman in the race.) Lander was a vocal supporter of Zohran Mamdani’s successful run for mayor of New York City; Mamdani has also backed Ocasio-Cortez’s opposition to Iron Dome funding. 

“American foreign policy to Israel has to change, and it has to condition support based on human rights and international law,” Lander, who identifies as a liberal Zionist, told The New York Times editorial board last week. Like some of his allies, Lander also cited the Leahy laws, which mandate that US military support go only to countries that adhere to international human rights law. 

Michael Blake, a left-wing challenger to pro-Israel New York Representative Ritchie Torres, also came out in opposition to Iron Dome funding in a recent debate. Torres, meanwhile, has doubled down on his own support of Iron Dome funding, issuing an impassioned statement backing it on Sunday. 

“There is a rapidly growing chorus of candidates calling for the defunding of missile defence systems like Iron Dome – at a time when millions of Israeli civilians are facing a constant barrage of rockets, drones, and ballistic missiles,” Torres said. “I will never join that bandwagon, no matter how politically expedient it may become.” 

Saying that “even the world’s most committed pacifist should have no objection to Iron Dome”, Torres emphasised that the system’s only purpose is to prevent civilians from being killed. He concluded, “Defunding Iron Dome would not bring peace. It would not de-escalate conflict or end war or save lives. It would serve only one purpose: more dead civilians.” 

Eylon Levy, a former spokesperson for the Israeli government, argued that the Iron Dome had delayed conflict with Hamas in Gaza. “If we didn’t have Iron Dome, we wouldn’t have tolerated 20 years of rocket fire from Gaza and waited for 7 October to eliminate the Hamas threat,” he wrote on X last week. “If Hamas’s rockets were hitting their targets, we would have been forced into an all-out war ages ago. Careful what you wish for.” 

Meanwhile, progressive Jewish California State Senator Scott Wiener, who is running for Nancy Pelosi’s seat in Congress and has called Israel’s actions in Gaza a “genocide”, said in a recent debate that he would continue to back Iron Dome funding. The debate was held after Ocasio-Cortez’s announcement that she was no longer supporting funding the Iron Dome. 

“I support the Iron Dome. I think there is, to me, a clear distinction,” Wiener said in contrast to one of his opponents, Ocasio-Cortez’s former chief of staff Saikat Chakrabarti, who claimed, “Defensive money can be used for offensive weapons.” 

Another key argument being made by progressives is that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has himself promoted the idea of winding down Israel’s financial dependence on the United States within the next decade. Senator Lindsay Graham, a key Republican ally of Netanyahu, has backed the call and said it could be accomplished sooner. 

“Netanyahu’s allies in the Knesset just approved a $45 billion [R742 billion] defence budget, and the Prime Minister himself also asserted his interest in withdrawing from the MOU with the United States in January,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote in her post, referring to the memorandum of understanding outlining US aid to Israel. 

Saltzman, for his part, views Netanyahu’s comments in a different light, noting that they came in response to Trump’s broader tariff plans. 

“Netanyahu wanted to show Trump that he understands the general trajectory of the new administration and is attuned to the new attitudes in the White House and is more than willing to plan accordingly,” he said. “It was political pragmatism.” 

But on the left, and elsewhere, the new political pragmatism around the Iron Dome may be to view its funding through the prism of “normalising” relations with Israel, or treating it as the United States treats other countries, by giving relatively little aid. 

“Across the political spectrum, a growing view is emerging: the US-Israel relationship should be ‘normalised’,” Ben-Ami wrote.