Much has been made of the Syrian and Iranian origin of Hezbollah's arsenal, but there has been little discussion in recent weeks about the origin of Israel's weapons.

The United States provides billions of dollars of military aid to Israel each year and the latest military operations in Lebanon and Gaza reflect a fighting machine bolstered by U.S. weapons, jet fuel and technology.

According to the U.S. Congressional Research Service, American aid to Israel has averaged at least $2 billion a year (two-thirds of which has been military assistance) since 1971.

However, U.S. think tank Foreign Policy in Focus says that figure has risen significantly since George W. Bush became president in 2001.

"During the Bush administration from 2001-2005, Israel received $10.5 billion in Foreign Military Financing -- the Pentagon's biggest military aid program -- and $6.3 billion in U.S. arms deliveries," FPIF says, quoting figures from a facts book published by the U.S. Department of Defense.

"The most prominent of these is a $4.5 billion sale of 102 Lockheed Martin F-16s to Israel."

As well as the F-16 Falcon fighter jets made by Texas-based Lockheed Martin, the U.S.-supplied arsenal includes Boeing-built F-15 Eagle fighters, AH-64 Apache attack helicopters and the Sparrow and Sidewinder missiles, made by Massachusetts-based Raytheon.

On July 21, the New York Times reported that the U.S. was "rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs" to Israel, which requested the shipment as it began air strikes against Lebanon on July 12.

The Times said some military officials had described the rush delivery as "unusual" and an indication that Israel still had a long list of targets to strike.

The U.S. Department of Defense says its military aid to Israel is going to "help foster stability in a historically volatile region."

U.S. Arms Act violation

It is a violation of the U.S. Arms Export Control Act to provide weapons to foreign countries that are not used for defence or to maintain internal security and back in 1981, the Reagan administration cut off U.S. military aid and weapons for 10 weeks while it investigated whether Israel was using arms for "defensive purposes" during its previous major incursion into Lebanon.

Yet, U.S.-supplied Israeli bombs have now killed at least 900 Lebanese in these latest attacks -- the overwhelming majority of them civilians. 

The bombing, which began on July 12 after Hezbollah guerrillas captured two Israeli soldiers during a cross-border raid, has also displaced hundreds of thousands of people and caused an estimated $2 billion in damage to Lebanon's infrastructure.

As he toured ruins in Beirut last week, UN emergency relief coordinator Jan Egeland accused Israel of breaking humanitarian law.

"It is horrific. I did not know it was block after block of houses...It makes it a violation of humanitarian law," Egeland said, just hours after an Israeli strike had devastated a suburb of Beirut.

However, both U.S. houses of Congress passed resolutions stating that Israel was acting in "self-defence." The vote in the Senate was unanimous, while the House vote was 410 to 8.

In step with President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, neither resolution called for a ceasefire.

The Senate resolution instead praised Israel for its "restraint," while the House resolution welcomed "Israel's continued efforts to prevent civilian casualties."

U.S.-supplied arsenal

According to a report by the World Policy Institute in New York, Israel's current arsenal is composed of equipment supplied under U.S. military aid programs.

That U.S.-supplied arsenal includes 226 F-16 fighter jets, 89 F-15 combat aircraft, over 700 M-60 tanks, more than 6,000 armoured personel carriers and scores of transport planes, apache attack helicopters, utility and training aircraft plus bombs and missiles "of all kinds."

Israel also may be in the market for a batch of 25 F-15I Ra'am fighters to add to a first squadron delivered in 1998, Tom Baranauskas of Forecast International, a U.S. aerospace consultancy, told Reuters.

The F-15Is would likely be Israel's choice for any future strikes it might carry out on Iranian facilities suspected of harbouring nuclear capabilities, Baranauskas said.

A 2005 arms-sale deal also allows Israel to purchase the GBU-28 "bunker buster" weapons, described as "a special weapon developed for penetrating hardened command centres located deep underground."

The New York Times quoted a U.S. military document as saying that "the Israeli Air Force will use these GBU-28's on their F-15 aircraft."

Israel is also testing Stryker eight-wheeled combat vehicles built by U.S. General Dynamics Corp. and considering the Littoral Combat Ship, an industry source told Reuters.

The ship is designed to meet such threats as speedboats that could be turned into suicide weapons.

Israel's Defense Forces website also boasts of Israeli-made pilot-less planes, used for either gathering intelligence or issuing "immediate efficient weapons." 

"Over the past decade, the United States has transferred more than $17 billion in military aid to this country (Israel) of just over six million people," the World Policy Institute says.

Hezbollah, meanwhile, has "at least a few hundred Fajr missiles," the New York Times reported. The Fajr missiles are believed to be Iranian in origin and have a range of 30 to 45 kilometres.

'Unique' relationship

"The billions of U.S. arms and aid it provides every year gives the Bush administration substantial leverage in pressing Israel for a cease fire in its attacks on Lebanon," notes William D. Hartung, a Senior Fellow at the World Policy Institute.

"Other countries don't have that sort of cash relationship, where they go straight to U.S. corporations with U.S. money to buy weapons that are then used in the Occupied Territories and against Lebanon," adds Senior Research Associate Frida Berrigan, also of the World Policy Institute.

"And the great thing about this relationship with Israel is, Israel doesn't have to pay for itself. It comes directly from U.S. taxpayers in the form of foreign military financing." 

The tight relationship between Israel and the U.S., the economic boon to Texas-based Lockheed and other U.S. weapons manufacturers, the silence from Congress and Bush's refusal to call for a cease-fire show the lack of opposition to the continued arms support from the U.S. to Israel is likely to continue.

"Bush could stop Israel in its tracks with a snap of his fingers," said Marjorie Cohn, president-elect of the U.S. National Lawyers Guild.

"But why would he? Israel is doing Bush's bidding and redrawing the map of the Middle East to facilitate U.S. domination. Bush began that task with Iraq. Israel is following suit with Palestine and Lebanon."