Letter to Thad Cochran, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, and Dick Durbin, Vice Chair of the Senate Committee on Appropriations - U.S.-Israel Cooperative Missile Defense Programs

Letter

Dear Chairman Cochran and Vice Chairman Durbin:

As you begin your work on the Fiscal Year 2016 Defense Appropriations bill, we write in strong support of fully funding U.S.-Israeli cooperation on missile defense. As you know, the cooperative programs being jointly developed by the United States and Israel continue to yield critical defense capabilities that protect Israel from missile and rocket threats from as near as the Gaza Strip and Lebanon and from as far as Iran. Indeed, investments in U.S.-Israeli missile defense cooperation over the years continue to prove their worth and have saved the lives of countless civilians from indiscriminate rocket and missile attacks.

The Fiscal Year 2016 President's Budget request includes funds for all three Cooperative Missile Defense Programs (Arrow System Improvement Program, Arrow III upper tier interceptor, and David's Sling) and a separate request for Iron Dome. In recent years, Congress has appropriated funding for U.S.-Israeli missile defense cooperation that significantly exceeded the President's Budget request. During consideration of your FY2016 bill, we respectfully request that you fund U.S.-Israeli cooperation on missile defense to a level that will allow Israel to fully meet its national security requirements.

The three Cooperative Missile Defense Programs and Iron Dome meet core Israeli national security requirements. Iron Dome is designed to intercept very short-range rocket threats between two and forty-five miles, primarily fired at Israel from the Gaza Strip, Syria, Lebanon, or the Sinai Peninsula. Iron Dome's selective targeting system and radar are designed to fire its Tamir interceptors only at incoming projectiles that pose threats to population centers. The Arrow Weapon System empowers Israel to defend against imminent and emerging missile threats, and also yields data and technology that advances U.S. ballistic missile defense programs. David's Sling is designed to complement Iron Dome and the Arrow Weapon System by providing defense against threats from large caliber artillery rockets, tactical ballistic missiles and cruise missiles.

Given the growth of rocket and missile threats in the Middle East, it is prudent for the United States and Israel to advance and significantly accelerate bilateral cooperation on missile defense. We therefore urge you to fully fund U.S.-Israeli joint missile defense programs so that Israel can continue to develop and improve the three Cooperative Missile Defense Programs, and to purchase sufficient Iron Dome systems, including co-production for those systems in the United States, to protect Israel's population against growing missile and rocket threats in the region.