In case anyone is interested-here is a new interview from one day ago (June 4th or 5th, 2026) that Zev Shalev conducted with Eddy Aragon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZfqIaL4vqQ
The US provides Israel with approximately $3.8 billion in annual military aid under a 2016-2028 memorandum of understanding (MOU), of which the $3.5 billion package you mentioned refers to a specific tranche released in August 2024 for Israel to purchase US-made weapons and equipment amid ongoing conflicts. This aid is almost entirely in the form of foreign military financing (FMF) credits, not cash transfers, and must be spent on American defense products. Calculating a precise “return on investment” (ROI) is challenging because it encompasses not just direct financial returns but also strategic, technological, and geopolitical benefits. Estimates vary widely based on the source and methodology, but I’ll break it down with substantiated data from across the spectrum, including both positive and critical views.
Direct Economic ROI
The strongest quantifiable ROI comes from the aid’s structure: Israel is required to spend nearly all of it (about 75-80%) on US-manufactured weapons, aircraft, and systems from companies like Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Raytheon. This creates a closed-loop subsidy for the US defense industry:
• Job creation and exports: For every $1 billion in aid spent on US arms, it supports roughly 6,000-10,000 American jobs in manufacturing, R&D, and supply chains. Overall, the $3.8 billion annual aid generates an estimated $11.4 billion in direct US economic activity (conservative figure accounting for multipliers like wages and taxes) or up to $19 billion when including indirect effects like boosted exports. Some analyses claim even higher returns, such as $41-48 billion annually, by factoring in broader economic spillovers from Israel’s tech ecosystem.
• Arms sales multiplier: Israel’s real-world testing of US weapons (e.g., F-35 jets, precision munitions) serves as a “battle lab,” improving designs and demonstrating reliability to other buyers. This has helped triple US global arms exports in past decades following Israeli conflicts, adding billions in revenue. For the $3.5 billion package specifically, it’s projected to fund purchases like munitions and aircraft parts, yielding a similar proportional ROI—potentially $10-17 billion in US economic benefits over time.
Critics argue this overstates the net gain, as the aid represents a fiscal burden (0.2% of the US discretionary budget) that could be redirected to domestic priorities like infrastructure or debt reduction ($37 trillion national debt as of 2023). They point out that Israel, with a GDP over $500 billion and arms exports worth $12-15 billion annually (three times the aid value), doesn’t “need” the subsidy financially, making it a poor allocation compared to aiding less developed allies.
Strategic and Geopolitical ROI
Beyond dollars, the aid yields high non-monetary returns by bolstering a key US ally in a volatile region:
• Deterrence and conflict prevention: Israel acts as a frontline deterrent against shared threats like Iran, Hezbollah, and other actors...
• Intelligence sharing: Israel supplies the US with critical intel on terrorism, cyber threats, and nuclear programs, estimated to save American lives and billions in counterterrorism costs. This “feedback loop” informs US homeland security and has shaped strategies against groups like ISIS.
Technological ROI
This is often cited as the highest-yield area:
• Joint innovations: US funding has co-developed systems like Iron Dome (US invested $1.6 billion, now integrated into American defenses), David’s Sling, and Arrow missiles, providing tech transfers that enhance US capabilities against threats like hypersonic weapons. Israel’s “Startup Nation” ecosystem (with R&D centers for Intel, Google, etc.) spins off advancements in cybersecurity, drones, AI, and water tech that benefit US firms—e.g., drip irrigation sustaining California agriculture or reverse osmosis desalination tech. The ROI here is estimated at 10x or more, with Israeli innovations contributing to US GDP growth in tech sectors.
• Cost efficiency: Israel spends over 5% of its GDP on defense (vs. US at 3.5%), stretching the aid’s value through agile R&D that the US can adopt cheaply.
Skeptics counter that the aid creates “Dutch Disease” in Israel—shifting resources to consumption over innovation—and that the US could access similar tech through commercial deals without subsidies. Additionally, Israel’s arms industry competes with US firms globally, potentially undercutting American exports.
Below is a side by side comparison table of US military aid to Ukraine as opposed to Israel over the same period...
Subscribe to The H-WAY Updates
By Hylton with a Y · Launched 9 months ago
"Truth. Courage. Israel. Unfiltered commentary, hard facts, and moral clarity — without fear or compromise. I write what others won’t say out loud: defending Israel, exposing hypocrisy, and standing up for truth in an age built on distortion."
"US-made Israeli F-16 fighter jets are seen on a runway in an airbase in southern Israel on March 4, 2024. Photo: Reuters / Reuters "
"Kazim AlamKazim Alam
October 8, 2024
Israel’s war on Gaza is proving to be a shot in the arm for the US economy, with up to 80 percent of its all-time high military aid to Tel Aviv in the last 12 months routed back to American companies.
US spending on Israeli military and related operations in the Middle East since October 7, 2023, is nearly $23 billion, substantially higher than in any other year since Washington began granting military aid to Israel in 1959, according to a research paper released by the Costs of War project by Brown University’s Watson Institute.
The terms of military aid require the Israeli government to divert most of that money back to the US for buying weapons from American companies.
The condition ensures a “steady flow” of income for US weapons firms that, in turn, provide “stable manufacturing jobs” in small and midsize communities across the country.
“The foreign military assistance programme requires most purchases to be from US companies. This is a longstanding arrangement, and the US makes this point in its arguments in favour of such assistance,” Harvard University professor Linda J Bilmes, who co-authored the research paper, tells TRT World.
Israel is one of the few countries that are allowed to buy arms directly from US companies with “minimal” oversight.
Bilmes says the Biden administration has “openly justified” its foreign aid spending for Israel in the name of “creating jobs for Americans” as US weapons makers hire workers to “replenish” the depleting stockpiles of arms and ammunition.
In the budget for 2025, the White House made a case for its $92 billion emergency supplemental request for urgent national security needs—including those relating to Israel—on the pretext that it would create and sustain jobs in “dozens of states across America”.
This becomes especially important in the political context, with the Democrats facing a stiff challenge from Republican candidate Donald Trump in this year’s presidential elections.
Trump has made the “failing American economy” under President Biden the centrepiece of his campaign, along with immigration.
Bilmes lists six big companies that are supplying arms and other equipment to Israel – Boeing, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, RTX (formerly Raytheon) and equipment producer Caterpillar.
These firms, along with their suppliers and financial institutions, have maintained “longstanding commercial relationships” with Israel, which is their “important customer”.
US-made Israeli jets hit the house of Palestinian teenager Dima Allamdani, killing 13 of her relatives, including her parents, seven siblings and four members of her uncle's family, in Khan Younis in southern Gaza. Photo: Reuters
By
Kazim Alam
October 8, 2024
The company has faced major financial difficulties over the past few years partly because of its commercial division that sells passenger aircraft.
But it has now “shifted its focus” to its defence, space and security (BDSS) division, which produces different models of bombers, helicopters and electronic surveillance equipment, the research paper says.
As of the latest quarter, Boeing’s BDSS division had orders amounting to $4 billion and an order backlog of $59 billion.
Other beneficiaries of war
General Dynamics, which originally produced F-16 jets, is the world’s fifth-largest weapons maker. It’s the only US company that produces metal bodies for the MK-80 bomb series, one of the primary aerial munitions Israel has been using to bomb Gaza.
The market value of General Dynamics has risen more than 37 percent in the last 12 months.
Northrop Grumman is the world's third-largest arms manufacturer. It has sold Israel the missile delivery system for Apache helicopters as well as laser-based weapon delivery systems for fighter jets.
It’s also the supplier of Sa'ar 5 warships that the Israeli Navy has used in its assault on Gaza.
The company’s total value has increased by more than 28 percent in the last one year.
Not just a monumental piece of shit, he’s also likely criminally liable if he has material evidence of a crime and refuses to turn it over. Only way he gets around that is if it would implicate him, which is protected under the 5th Amendment. Otherwise he can be charged as an accessory after the fact to whatever crime he’s concealing evidence of. Whether you could convict him or not is a matter for a jury, but you could swear him over it, and the probable cause is his own statement that he knows something.
If you’ve followed the Epstein case over the years, Aragon stands out as one of the very few who has consistently pushed for transparency and shared detailed research publicly. A few points worth considering: 1. Fabricating an email and then presenting it to a federal agency would be extraordinarily reckless and foolish — it simply doesn’t pass the basic common-sense test.2. When someone has spent years methodically mapping connections, analyzing documents, and doing deep investigative work, it’s reasonable for them to be compensated for their time and expertise.
3. Accusing others while ignoring that many content creators in this space (including Elisa) benefit from engagement and clicks comes across as selective outrage driven more by jealousy than principle.4. At the end of the day, if your own Epstein research consists mainly of repackaging other people’s findings, it might be more productive to focus on original work instead of attacking those who’ve actually done the heavy lifting.
Criticism is fair game, but baseless accusations and personal attacks don’t help uncover the truth.
Thanks for this info, Alisa. I've always had the feeling that this particular theory was a bit weak in supportive evidence. Were the claims possible, even plausible? Perhaps, but there never seemed to be much to bolster their validity. Many of us would be inclined to believe just about anything COULD be true about Epstein and his associates, but believing things that might later prove to be false, weakens the case and lessens the possibility for justice.
I read a while ago that Epstein ordered a Cremation oven for Zorro Ranch. I don’t know if that would be in the emails or not. He might have been authorized one because of who he knew.
From the few minutes I saw him on Zev’s channel, he seemed sketchy, it didn’t even seem like he wanted to talk. I had serious doubts he knew anything. I watched for 10 min, nothing was forthcoming and turned it off, thinking WTH is wrong with this guy?
Salut comment ça va? Now this one is gonna be good. I just wait for YouTube when I want to transcribe. Though Dean should have his @Substack out pretty quickly.
It is irrelevant if there were literal bodies buried at the ranch or not. Every single person involved with the transaction of that land before and after Epstein’s ownership most likely is guilty of something in a normal-functioning society. The same logic applies to other properties that ever owned by Epstein.
That being said, whoever in possession of his properties after Epstein’s death under Trump custody most likely are part of the Trump-Epstein child-trafficking operation, because the goal of the “sale” of the properties clearly was to silence the victims.
A crime-syndicate’s crimes doesn’t end with one person’s death. It is a fact that GOP used the Lolita Express for campaign purpose in 2024. They were confident that they had everything under “control” because they believed all relevant physical evidence have been destroyed.
In case anyone is interested-here is a new interview from one day ago (June 4th or 5th, 2026) that Zev Shalev conducted with Eddy Aragon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZfqIaL4vqQ
Okay, then, Alisa, what conclusions should we draw about Banksy-style artworks you found from Google Maps?
I was just about to share them? But, are they legit or not?
Sounds just like Michael Wolff 💩
What a POS
https://hyltonwithay.substack.com/p/an-analysis-of-the-us-military-aid
An Analysis of the US Military Aid to Israel
Hylton with a Y
Nov 15, 2025
The US provides Israel with approximately $3.8 billion in annual military aid under a 2016-2028 memorandum of understanding (MOU), of which the $3.5 billion package you mentioned refers to a specific tranche released in August 2024 for Israel to purchase US-made weapons and equipment amid ongoing conflicts. This aid is almost entirely in the form of foreign military financing (FMF) credits, not cash transfers, and must be spent on American defense products. Calculating a precise “return on investment” (ROI) is challenging because it encompasses not just direct financial returns but also strategic, technological, and geopolitical benefits. Estimates vary widely based on the source and methodology, but I’ll break it down with substantiated data from across the spectrum, including both positive and critical views.
Direct Economic ROI
The strongest quantifiable ROI comes from the aid’s structure: Israel is required to spend nearly all of it (about 75-80%) on US-manufactured weapons, aircraft, and systems from companies like Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Raytheon. This creates a closed-loop subsidy for the US defense industry:
• Job creation and exports: For every $1 billion in aid spent on US arms, it supports roughly 6,000-10,000 American jobs in manufacturing, R&D, and supply chains. Overall, the $3.8 billion annual aid generates an estimated $11.4 billion in direct US economic activity (conservative figure accounting for multipliers like wages and taxes) or up to $19 billion when including indirect effects like boosted exports. Some analyses claim even higher returns, such as $41-48 billion annually, by factoring in broader economic spillovers from Israel’s tech ecosystem.
• Arms sales multiplier: Israel’s real-world testing of US weapons (e.g., F-35 jets, precision munitions) serves as a “battle lab,” improving designs and demonstrating reliability to other buyers. This has helped triple US global arms exports in past decades following Israeli conflicts, adding billions in revenue. For the $3.5 billion package specifically, it’s projected to fund purchases like munitions and aircraft parts, yielding a similar proportional ROI—potentially $10-17 billion in US economic benefits over time.
Critics argue this overstates the net gain, as the aid represents a fiscal burden (0.2% of the US discretionary budget) that could be redirected to domestic priorities like infrastructure or debt reduction ($37 trillion national debt as of 2023). They point out that Israel, with a GDP over $500 billion and arms exports worth $12-15 billion annually (three times the aid value), doesn’t “need” the subsidy financially, making it a poor allocation compared to aiding less developed allies.
Strategic and Geopolitical ROI
Beyond dollars, the aid yields high non-monetary returns by bolstering a key US ally in a volatile region:
• Deterrence and conflict prevention: Israel acts as a frontline deterrent against shared threats like Iran, Hezbollah, and other actors...
• Intelligence sharing: Israel supplies the US with critical intel on terrorism, cyber threats, and nuclear programs, estimated to save American lives and billions in counterterrorism costs. This “feedback loop” informs US homeland security and has shaped strategies against groups like ISIS.
Technological ROI
This is often cited as the highest-yield area:
• Joint innovations: US funding has co-developed systems like Iron Dome (US invested $1.6 billion, now integrated into American defenses), David’s Sling, and Arrow missiles, providing tech transfers that enhance US capabilities against threats like hypersonic weapons. Israel’s “Startup Nation” ecosystem (with R&D centers for Intel, Google, etc.) spins off advancements in cybersecurity, drones, AI, and water tech that benefit US firms—e.g., drip irrigation sustaining California agriculture or reverse osmosis desalination tech. The ROI here is estimated at 10x or more, with Israeli innovations contributing to US GDP growth in tech sectors.
• Cost efficiency: Israel spends over 5% of its GDP on defense (vs. US at 3.5%), stretching the aid’s value through agile R&D that the US can adopt cheaply.
Skeptics counter that the aid creates “Dutch Disease” in Israel—shifting resources to consumption over innovation—and that the US could access similar tech through commercial deals without subsidies. Additionally, Israel’s arms industry competes with US firms globally, potentially undercutting American exports.
Below is a side by side comparison table of US military aid to Ukraine as opposed to Israel over the same period...
Subscribe to The H-WAY Updates
By Hylton with a Y · Launched 9 months ago
"Truth. Courage. Israel. Unfiltered commentary, hard facts, and moral clarity — without fear or compromise. I write what others won’t say out loud: defending Israel, exposing hypocrisy, and standing up for truth in an age built on distortion."
https://www.trtworld.com/article/18217466
"US-made Israeli F-16 fighter jets are seen on a runway in an airbase in southern Israel on March 4, 2024. Photo: Reuters / Reuters "
"Kazim AlamKazim Alam
October 8, 2024
Israel’s war on Gaza is proving to be a shot in the arm for the US economy, with up to 80 percent of its all-time high military aid to Tel Aviv in the last 12 months routed back to American companies.
US spending on Israeli military and related operations in the Middle East since October 7, 2023, is nearly $23 billion, substantially higher than in any other year since Washington began granting military aid to Israel in 1959, according to a research paper released by the Costs of War project by Brown University’s Watson Institute.
The terms of military aid require the Israeli government to divert most of that money back to the US for buying weapons from American companies.
The condition ensures a “steady flow” of income for US weapons firms that, in turn, provide “stable manufacturing jobs” in small and midsize communities across the country.
“The foreign military assistance programme requires most purchases to be from US companies. This is a longstanding arrangement, and the US makes this point in its arguments in favour of such assistance,” Harvard University professor Linda J Bilmes, who co-authored the research paper, tells TRT World.
Israel is one of the few countries that are allowed to buy arms directly from US companies with “minimal” oversight.
Bilmes says the Biden administration has “openly justified” its foreign aid spending for Israel in the name of “creating jobs for Americans” as US weapons makers hire workers to “replenish” the depleting stockpiles of arms and ammunition.
In the budget for 2025, the White House made a case for its $92 billion emergency supplemental request for urgent national security needs—including those relating to Israel—on the pretext that it would create and sustain jobs in “dozens of states across America”.
This becomes especially important in the political context, with the Democrats facing a stiff challenge from Republican candidate Donald Trump in this year’s presidential elections.
Trump has made the “failing American economy” under President Biden the centrepiece of his campaign, along with immigration.
Bilmes lists six big companies that are supplying arms and other equipment to Israel – Boeing, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, RTX (formerly Raytheon) and equipment producer Caterpillar.
These firms, along with their suppliers and financial institutions, have maintained “longstanding commercial relationships” with Israel, which is their “important customer”.
US-made Israeli jets hit the house of Palestinian teenager Dima Allamdani, killing 13 of her relatives, including her parents, seven siblings and four members of her uncle's family, in Khan Younis in southern Gaza. Photo: Reuters
By
Kazim Alam
October 8, 2024
The company has faced major financial difficulties over the past few years partly because of its commercial division that sells passenger aircraft.
But it has now “shifted its focus” to its defence, space and security (BDSS) division, which produces different models of bombers, helicopters and electronic surveillance equipment, the research paper says.
As of the latest quarter, Boeing’s BDSS division had orders amounting to $4 billion and an order backlog of $59 billion.
Other beneficiaries of war
General Dynamics, which originally produced F-16 jets, is the world’s fifth-largest weapons maker. It’s the only US company that produces metal bodies for the MK-80 bomb series, one of the primary aerial munitions Israel has been using to bomb Gaza.
The market value of General Dynamics has risen more than 37 percent in the last 12 months.
Northrop Grumman is the world's third-largest arms manufacturer. It has sold Israel the missile delivery system for Apache helicopters as well as laser-based weapon delivery systems for fighter jets.
It’s also the supplier of Sa'ar 5 warships that the Israeli Navy has used in its assault on Gaza.
The company’s total value has increased by more than 28 percent in the last one year.
Whole other side of the foot tattoo than Chuck Johnson, but all the same three feet as Ze’ev is aware. Trinity Session was a really good album.
https://www.taosnews.com/public-safety/police-confirm-body-is-missing-taos-woman-lanl-worker/article_b498ac86-c4e1-408b-8984-a8c48377945b.html
Not just a monumental piece of shit, he’s also likely criminally liable if he has material evidence of a crime and refuses to turn it over. Only way he gets around that is if it would implicate him, which is protected under the 5th Amendment. Otherwise he can be charged as an accessory after the fact to whatever crime he’s concealing evidence of. Whether you could convict him or not is a matter for a jury, but you could swear him over it, and the probable cause is his own statement that he knows something.
Can we all just acknowledge that we are under Israeli occupation? We have to get past the outrage- the destruction is the point.
America is occupied.
If you’ve followed the Epstein case over the years, Aragon stands out as one of the very few who has consistently pushed for transparency and shared detailed research publicly. A few points worth considering: 1. Fabricating an email and then presenting it to a federal agency would be extraordinarily reckless and foolish — it simply doesn’t pass the basic common-sense test.2. When someone has spent years methodically mapping connections, analyzing documents, and doing deep investigative work, it’s reasonable for them to be compensated for their time and expertise.
3. Accusing others while ignoring that many content creators in this space (including Elisa) benefit from engagement and clicks comes across as selective outrage driven more by jealousy than principle.4. At the end of the day, if your own Epstein research consists mainly of repackaging other people’s findings, it might be more productive to focus on original work instead of attacking those who’ve actually done the heavy lifting.
Criticism is fair game, but baseless accusations and personal attacks don’t help uncover the truth.
Thanks for this info, Alisa. I've always had the feeling that this particular theory was a bit weak in supportive evidence. Were the claims possible, even plausible? Perhaps, but there never seemed to be much to bolster their validity. Many of us would be inclined to believe just about anything COULD be true about Epstein and his associates, but believing things that might later prove to be false, weakens the case and lessens the possibility for justice.
Hello Alisa,
I read a while ago that Epstein ordered a Cremation oven for Zorro Ranch. I don’t know if that would be in the emails or not. He might have been authorized one because of who he knew.
Just a thought.
From the few minutes I saw him on Zev’s channel, he seemed sketchy, it didn’t even seem like he wanted to talk. I had serious doubts he knew anything. I watched for 10 min, nothing was forthcoming and turned it off, thinking WTH is wrong with this guy?
Salut comment ça va? Now this one is gonna be good. I just wait for YouTube when I want to transcribe. Though Dean should have his @Substack out pretty quickly.
Or you and Sarah can do Purple Like a Bruise and share in your own words and work.
Recommended to Sarah, she and I drink Moose Drool Stout and Arrogant Bastard Pale Ale as Black & Tans, and play darts simultaneously.
I’m really looking forward to Black & Tans with @Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez and @Sarah Kendzior.
There r
It is irrelevant if there were literal bodies buried at the ranch or not. Every single person involved with the transaction of that land before and after Epstein’s ownership most likely is guilty of something in a normal-functioning society. The same logic applies to other properties that ever owned by Epstein.
That being said, whoever in possession of his properties after Epstein’s death under Trump custody most likely are part of the Trump-Epstein child-trafficking operation, because the goal of the “sale” of the properties clearly was to silence the victims.
A crime-syndicate’s crimes doesn’t end with one person’s death. It is a fact that GOP used the Lolita Express for campaign purpose in 2024. They were confident that they had everything under “control” because they believed all relevant physical evidence have been destroyed.