Rubio: Israel rich enough to buy its own weapons, Trump wants military aid to end ‘as soon as possible’

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio says that US President Donald Trump believes Israel is “prosperous and rich enough” to buy American weapons without relying on military aid, and that the president wants that arrangement to come into effect “as soon as possible.”

Trump, says Rubio, “would like for the financing portion to end as soon as possible.”

“We’re working through that in terms of how we negotiate the memorandum of understanding,” he tells reporters at the G7 meeting in Paris. “But the president’s expectation is that Israel is now prosperous and rich enough to be able to be a sales country. They can buy the weapons from us, but we no longer have to provide the financing.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier this year that he wants to move Israel off US aid over the course of a decade. But Trump said last week that there is an agreement for the aid to cease by the end of the year, a statement that took many top officials on both sides by surprise.

Rubio says that Israel can “absolutely” get off aid by the end of the year if it wants to.

“They also produce weaponry, by the way, so part of the MOU would also involve the ability to co-produce on some things,” Rubio says, adding that “we’ll negotiate the timeline.”

“The president wants it as soon as possible,” he says. “He thinks it makes sense to do it as soon as possible.”