Letter: The real truth about the $3 billion

Either Patricia Gray doesn’t know, or doesn’t want you to know, that the $3 billion a year that goes to Israel arose from the Camp David accords resulting in a peace treaty with Egypt ("Withdraw aid to Israel” letter to the editor in the Feb. 24 edition of the Daily Journal). At the same time, Egypt received $2 billion a year, which former President Jimmy Carter and Congress deemed appropriate at the time to achieve the first peace treaty in the Middle East between Israel and any of the nations that want to wipe it off the face of the earth.

Most of these billions get plowed right back into the U.S. defense industry, so this is not a free gift. Israel gave up, in return for peace, an oil supply worth much more than $3 billion a year at today’s prices, the vast strategic depth of the Sinai Peninsula, land it had captured in two defensive wars, and many other military advantages it desperately needed because of its minuscule size.

While Israel has contributed much to the world, it is not at all a prosperous state. An alarmingly high rate of its citizens, both Jewish and Arab, live below the poverty line. It is still at war with the 20 Arab countries who have not made peace with it, plus Iran. Furthermore, the United States sells tens of billions of dollars of its latest weaponry to many of its enemies.

So for Gray to couch her letter in terms off Israel taking food out of American mouths is fundamentally dishonest.

Desmond Tuck

San Mateo