Tucker Carlson is \u201ctormented.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not by a policy failure, not by a domestic crisis \u2014 by the fact, he said this week, that President Donald Trump backed Israel in a war against Iran.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s in line with a grievance the podcaster and former Fox News host has nursed for months<\/a>.<\/p>\n He\u2019s told his followers<\/a> that Israel is \u201ca completely insignificant country\u201d with \u201cno resources.\u201d<\/p>\n America gets \u201cnothing\u201d from the relationship, he\u2019s said, repeating a theme that echoes throughout the right-wing influencer world.<\/p>\n Theo Von, the third-biggest podcaster on Spotify<\/a>, declared on his show: \u201cAll of our f\u2014ing money goes to Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n Candace Owens turned such complaints into her brand\u2019s growth engine<\/a>.<\/p>\n Influencers are political adolescents \u2014 especially in this era of grift, when an emotional statement on a visceral topic can achieve instant fame.<\/p>\n But to be fair to Von and those who rightfully question US foreign aid, the idea of giving $3.8 billion a year to a country of 10 million on the other side of the world while Americans struggle at home is genuinely puzzling.<\/p>\n It deserves a real answer.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s the truth: It\u2019s the best investment the US government makes.<\/p>\n Most of that $3.8 billion must be spent on American-made military equipment.<\/p>\n That\u2019s not charity \u2014 it\u2019s a subsidy for our own defense industrial base.<\/p>\n Israel\u2019s largest purchases flow to Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon and General Dynamics.<\/p>\n The F-35 program alone \u2014 which Israel was the first to use in combat \u2014 supports 290,000 American jobs, generates $72 billion in annual economic output and has produced a $173 billion order backlog.<\/p>\n Israel\u2019s real-world combat testing fixed critical glitches engineers couldn\u2019t replicate in a lab, contributing to over $40 billion in export sales.<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s the value of Israel\u2019s intelligence assistance.<\/p>\n The intel Israel provides would cost America \u201cfive CIAs\u201d to produce independently, US Air Force Gen. George Keegan estimated decades ago \u2014 and that has only compounded since.<\/p>\n The National Intelligence Program budget was $82 billion for fiscal year 2026; even attributing a fifth of that to CIA-equivalent operations, you\u2019re looking at a return that dwarfs a $3.8 billion investment many times over.<\/p>\n Israel also shares daily operational lessons from every American weapons system it fields, saving an estimated 10 to 20 years and potentially billions in research and development.<\/p>\n In 2021, the Pentagon formally moved Israel into US Central Command \u2014 institutional recognition that the Jewish state was America\u2019s strategic anchor in the Middle East.<\/p>\n That\u2019s a crucial benefit in a region that sits atop 48% of global oil reserves and straddles the shipping lanes between Asia and the West.<\/p>\n A single Gerald R. Ford-class carrier<\/a> costs $13 billion to build and up to $8 million per day to operate \u2014 and experts have assessed that Israel\u2019s military effectively replaces multiple US aircraft carriers<\/a> and ground divisions across the Mediterranean, Red Sea and Persian Gulf.<\/p>\n That\u2019s without a single permanent US soldier stationed there, while in Europe we spend $25 billion to $30 billion a year to station 80,000 troops.<\/p>\n Israel\u2019s June 2025 air offensive against Iran \u2014 featuring 200 US-made F-35s, F-16s and F-15s \u2014 was the most consequential live demonstration of American air superiority in a generation.<\/p>\n It exposed the vulnerabilities of Russian and Chinese air defenses, tilted the global balance of power in Washington\u2019s favor and became the best sales pitch Lockheed Martin could ever ask for.<\/p>\n Beyond defense, Israeli firms are the second-largest source of foreign listings on NASDAQ, and Israeli investment in the United States has tripled to nearly $24 billion.<\/p>\n In New York alone, 600 Israeli-founded companies generated $19.5 billion in output last year and supported 57,000 jobs; bilateral trade tops $49 billion.<\/p>\n Now here\u2019s the part the podcasters can\u2019t engage with, because it requires actually understanding the region.<\/p>\n