Israel will buy six V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel made the announcement during his keynote address at the 100th annual Anti-Defamation League meeting, calling Israel’s self-defense capabilities and its qualitative military edge “central to both Israel and U.S. security interests.”
“Israel will get six V-22s out of the next order to go on the assembly line, and they will be compatible with other [Israeli defense force] capabilities,” he said. “The Israeli and American defense relationship is stronger than ever.”
With Afghanistan winding down, Hagel said, “we continue to face a complicated and volatile world. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the Middle East, where the United States and our allies are facing an unprecedented set of complex challenges.”
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For Israel, the secretary noted, progress with one neighbor tends to bring new threats from other directions. “There are no margins for Israel,” he said.
