Israel and U.S. are close to a deal on the biggest military aid package ever

According to U.S. and Israeli analysts familiar with the negotiations, the Obama administration is insisting on phasing out a special arrangement that has allowed Israel to spend 26 percent of U.S. aid on its own defense research, development and procurement.

..With Israel’s defense industry now thriving, the administration wants to pare that back and require that more U.S. aid go to American companies providing goods and services.

The possibility that Israeli defense companies could lose hundreds of millions of dollars of contracts is already causing controversy. Critics say they fear it could impair Israel’s ability to maintain equipment that is the most advanced in the region, known as its qualitative military edge.

.. “Though he has been a strong supporter of Israeli security throughout his term, there’s clearly a difficult relationship between Netanyahu and Obama,” said Ilan Goldenberg, director of the Middle East Security Program at the Center for a New American Security. “For them to agree on this would send a signal to the world that although their personal relationship is not great, here Obama is making a down payment on 10 years of deep U.S.-Israeli security cooperation. That’s a powerful message.”

.. Makovsky also cited the “unpredictability factor” of Donald Trump as a potential successor to Obama.

Donald Trump and Mike Pence: One Ticket, Two Worldviews

As the fighting continued year after year, Mr. Pence kept up his support, speaking forcefully in favor of the Iraq war even as many Americans turned against it. But his firm stance on that invasion now represents one of the most jarring differences in his abrupt political marriage to Donald J. Trump  ..

.. From the use of force to free trade to diplomacy, Mr. Trump and Mr. Pence hold very different views of the United States’ role in the world

.. Mr. Pence has adopted a firmer position, telling a conservative gathering in 2015: “Israel’s enemies are our enemies.”

 .. “I believe it is imperative that conservatives again embrace America’s role as leader of the free world and the arsenal of democracy,” he said last year at the Conservative Political Action Conference, as he called for “dramatically” increasing military spending.
.. Mr. Pence has expressed his approval of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and voted for trade agreements while a member of the House. During his first successful congressional campaign, in 2000, his opponents criticized the North American Free Trade Agreement, or Nafta, but Mr. Pence expressed support for the trade pact and the idea of free trade.

.. Mr. Trump insists that the United States is losing when it comes to trade. In 2001, Mr. Pence said that when American companies compete globally, “We win, and we win consistently.”