Sec. Hagel Meets with Israeli Counterpart; Provides V-22 Test Drive

Sara Fried — June 17, 2013 – 11:43 am | Foreign Policy | Israel Comments (0) Add a comment

DOD Photo by Erin A. Kirk-Cuomo

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel met with Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon during his first official visit to Washington on Friday. In April, Hagel announced that the Obama Administration would provide Israel with the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft “as part of an unprecedented package of advance military capabilities that will increase Israel’s qualitative military edge.”

According to the Department of Defense, Yaalon flew to the Pentagon in the V-22, and “Yaalon and his delegation experienced some of the Osprey’s unique capabilities as Israel plans to incorporate the aircraft into future military planning.” Video from the flight is available here and below.

During his visit to Washington, Yaalon also spoke before the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He praised Secretary Hagel’s remarks to the Institute six weeks earlier:

What was expressed in Secretary Hagel’s briefing here is the bond between the United States and the State of Israel, based on common interests and common values, and I can tell you that…we have established intimate, earnest dialogue between us… for the benefit of our two countries. And today, my visit is part of these ongoing discussions which has to be done frequently according to the changes in our neighborhood, the Middle East.

Yaalon further emphasized the commonalities between the United States and Israel, and the role of the United States in working with Israel:

I believe that the cooperation and the bond between the United States and Israel is very, very important. Again, looking around to the Middle East, there is one democracy, stabilized, which is able to defend itself by itself, no need to deploy neither American troops nor other in order to defend Israel, sharing the same interests as well as the same values. And I have to say, that the cooperation between our two establishments, in the broader perspective not just the military, intelligence and all the other elements of security is a pillar in our ability, both United States and Israel, to meet the challenges ahead of us. And I believe that in this case we are going the right way regarding the cooperation, but the challenges are ahead of us and I hope that you will find the right way to prevail.

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