Steve Bannon Calls Donald Trump's Israel Aid Cutoff a 'Last Minute Gimmick'

Steve Bannon on Tuesday questioned President Donald Trump's Election Day announcement that U.S. aid to Israel will end at the close of the year. He called it "a last minute gimmick" and asked whether Israel would also be taken out of the annual defense bill.

Bannon, the former White House chief strategist who hosts War Room, made the remark immediately after his co-host John Solomon praised the move as "a really big deal for the president."

"John, it feels like a last minute gimmick," Bannon said. "Are we going to get Israel out of the NDAA so they're not going to be interwoven into our military systems...? Because that's the big thing. The money is marginalia, right?"

"Is the president prepared to do that, you think?" he added.

The National Defense Authorization Act is the annual Pentagon policy law. Later in the show, turning to Neil McCabe, who was reporting for the program from the White House, Bannon returned to the timing, saying: "It's kind of, I think, quite odd to do that at the beginning of voting day."

What Donald Trump Announced on Israel Aid

Trump announced the change on Fox & Friends on Tuesday morning, as polls were opening. "We were giving them $4 billion – we are – but it gets cut off at the end of the year," he said, according to Fox News, and he added that Israel could still buy American weapons: "They can buy whatever they want."

Trump described the aid as a political liability. "Why should we suffer the slings from lunatics like an El-Sayed when they don't need it?" he said, Fox News reported. He was referring to Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic Senate nominee in Michigan, who leads Republican Mike Rogers by 5.2 points in PolitiKool's polling average. The Israel aid fight had become a live issue in that race, which Joy-Ann Reid tied to household budgets on Monday night.

Trump did not say how the aid would end. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office and Israel's Defense Ministry did not immediately comment, and two Israeli Finance Ministry sources said they were surprised because budgets had been drafted around the existing agreement, ABC News reported.

The MOU and the NDAA Behind Israel Aid

The aid rests on a 10-year memorandum of understanding signed in 2016. It covers fiscal 2019 through 2028 and pledges $3.3 billion a year in Foreign Military Financing (FMF) plus $500 million for joint missile defense programs such as Iron Dome, David's Sling and Arrow, all subject to congressional appropriation, according to the Congressional Research Service.

Congress put that commitment into law in the fiscal 2021 NDAA, which authorizes "not less than" $3.3 billion in annual FMF to Israel through 2028. Appropriators have matched that level each year, CRS found. The White House has not said how a cutoff at the end of this year would square with that statutory floor.

John Solomon Defends the Move as Mark Levin Draws a Jab

Solomon called the cutoff something Israel had wanted for years. "Quite frankly, I know this will be portrayed as a slap by president Trump at Israel, but both sides have wanted this," he said. "It makes sense. It's good for America. It's good for Israel."

He also pointed to the timing. "At the end of the day, it might inspire a few people to go out and vote today," Solomon said. "Some people say, I wish it was a few weeks ago. I get that element too."

Solomon added that "the idea that Israel needs foreign aid is laughable."

Trump gave a similar account. He said Netanyahu had proposed the change and that the two leaders had discussed it for years, according to Fox News. But he did not say how the shift to commercial sales would work or what would happen to the missile defense money for Iron Dome, David's Sling and Arrow that the MOU covers separately from FMF.

The exchange followed a clip of conservative radio host Mark Levin, one of Israel's loudest defenders on the right, warning that Republican turnout was "light" and saying that a loss would not be "because of the Iran war" or gas prices. Bannon replied: "Mark Levin, talk about psycho babble from Tel Aviv Levin."

Tucker Carlson has warned the Iran war would get Republicans "crushed". In the clip Bannon answered, Levin defended the Iran action, saying "they had a nuclear obsession and that had to be stopped."

What Happens Next

The aid deadline Trump set falls about three months into fiscal 2027, with the MOU still running through September 2028 and the 2021 authorization still law. Whether the White House asks Congress to change either, and whether it takes on Israel's role in the NDAA, as Bannon asked, are still open questions.