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The Eighth Front: Inside Israel’s $1 Billion Influence Campaign
Nick Cleveland-Stout
Posted on July 24, 2026
Executive Summary
The Israeli government has spent more than $1 billion in direct expenditures on public diplomacy since the Hamas–led attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, a dramatic escalation in such spending.This represents Israel’s new reliance on influence operations in the United States, funded directly by the country’s government and subject to American laws on foreign influence.
For most of the US–Israel relationship’s history, Israel garnered unrivaled influence in US politics through an informal lobby made up of American citizens and organizations like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, and Christians United for Israel, or CUFI, as well as individual mega-donors. These organizations are not required to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, or FARA, because they are funded by Americans and nominally act independently of the Israeli government. This system gave Israel enormous influence without triggering the disclosure requirements for direct foreign lobbying.
The deep unpopularity of Israel’s post–Oct. 7 military offensives among the American public spurred Israel to reassess the scope and structure of its influence operations. The Israeli government subsequently reinvented its public relations strategy byhiring registered foreign agents directly so that it could control messaging, target specific demographics, and act with speed and precision. Since 2023, Israel has spent over $100 million on influence in the US under FARA.
This paper uses FARA data, Israeli government procurement documents, and interviews with dozens of sources to trace the size and effects of this shift. Israel’s FARA spending is set to triple from 2024 to 2026, and the country is on track to become the single biggest FARA spender this year. Much of this work flows through theFrench firm Havas Media,which subcontracts with American firms that specialize in reaching the once most reliable sources of support that Israel is now losing: Evangelicals, conservatives, and young Americans. The tactics are new in kind, not just scale: payinginfluencers directly, funding a mass texting operation, and, the most novel of these new approaches, hiring firms like Clock Tower X to build networks of websites designed to shape how artificial intelligence chatbots characterize Israel.
This shift toward FARA–registrable engagement creates a new paper trail. But significant gaps in compliance and transparency remain: Organizations conducting clear lobbying activities have failed to register as lobbyists, some new firms working for Israel have openly flouted transparency requirements, and paid influencers have not disclosed their financial relationships with the Israeli government.
Israel’s new tactics are transforming America’s influence landscape, but they have so far proved insufficient to counter the erosion in public support that is being driven by Israel’s deeply unpopular policies. That said, Israeli influence operations have a commanding record of shaping American public opinion, and the infrastructure that Israel is now building is unlike anything previously deployed — it should not be underestimated.
> https://quincyinst.org/research/the-eighth-front-inside-israels-1-billion-influence-campaign/#h-introduction
>hiring firms like Clock Tower X t
Clock Tower Xis a political and cultural communications firm owned by former Trump campaign managerBrad Parscale. It specializes in digital storytelling, audience data architecture, and AI-driven content deployment