Trump Says Israel and Gulf Allies Will Repay US Costs of the Iran War

In an interview with CBS News that aired on Sunday, Trump said those countries would "pay us any and all costs we had for the war". "We're going to get all that money back," he said. "They're going to do it, 100 percent. Because without us, they wouldn't exist."

For Gulf governments and the investors who deal with them, the question is less whether a bill will arrive than how Washington might try to collect. Gulf sovereign funds and companies have pledged large sums for US investment in recent years, and several analysts said those commitments, along with weapons orders, are the most likely currency for any settlement.

The US military put the cost of the war at $47.1 billion as of mid-October, a figure that excludes repairs to damaged US bases in the region, Al Jazeera reported. The Congressional Budget Office estimated in September that each additional month of fighting would add $2 billion to $3 billion.

Trump first raised the idea of reimbursement in July, when he named Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait as countries that should pay for US protection around the Strait of Hormuz, where American forces have been escorting ships. "We're protecting a very rich portion of the world, we're spending money, and so what we've done is we're going to be reimbursed for protection," he said at the time.

Gulf states have said they were not told in advance of Washington's plans to attack Iran and have since absorbed much of Tehran's retaliation, including strikes on energy infrastructure and shipping. Through the Gulf Cooperation Council they have pushed for a diplomatic end to the conflict.

The demand follows heavy Republican losses in last week's midterm elections, which Trump has acknowledged were partly driven by public anger over the war. He has since described the conflict as "effectively over" in military terms.

Signalling Rather Than Policy

Analysts interviewed by Al Jazeera played down the prospect of direct payments. Neil Quilliam, an associate fellow at Chatham House, said the remarks were "best understood as political signalling rather than a serious policy proposal." Bader al-Saif, an assistant professor of history at Kuwait University, said the comments were made "for domestic consumption" and that most Gulf governments would read them that way.

But al-Saif said Trump could be "very innovative" in defining repayment. "There's many agreements for him to go back to and to claim," he said. "There have been a lot of [Gulf] pledges for investment in the US."

Farid Boussaid of the University of Amsterdam said any compensation was likely to be indirect, taking the form of commercial investment in the United States and further purchases of US weapons systems beyond those already ordered.

Trump has repeatedly recast trade and investment frameworks as payments to the US. He described the European Union's expected $600 billion of US investment under a July 2025 trade deal as a "gift", and Japan's $550 billion pledge as being "like a signing bonus".

Israel May Face More Pressure

Stefan Lukas, a Middle East security analyst, told Al Jazeera that Washington's Arab partners were unlikely to face large compensation payments. He said Trump could be more serious about extracting economic concessions from Israel, which the president has said will stop receiving US aid after the end of this year.

No Gulf government had responded publicly to Trump's remarks by Tuesday. The US-Iran negotiations that Trump said last week were showing "positive momentum" after talks with Qatar's prime minister are the next point at which the cost of the war, and who bears it, is likely to come up.