Israel is increasingly relying on foreign agents, rather than traditional US allies like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), to expand its influence in the US, according to a new Quincy Institute paper released Friday, Anadolu reports.
The paper, titled The Eighth Front: Inside Israel’s $1 Billion Influence Campaign, was authored by Nick Cleveland-Stout, a research associate at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
Since 2023, Israel has spent more than $1 billion on public diplomacy, including over $100 million on US influence efforts disclosed under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). It is on pace to become the largest FARA spender this year.
Seventeen firms registered under FARA to represent Israeli interests in 2024–2025, including Brad Parscale’s Clock Tower X, which holds a $46.5 million contract. The firm disclosed efforts to shape AI chatbot outputs by seeding pro-Israel content into Large Language Model training data through a network of websites.
FARA filings show Israel also funded influencer campaigns and mass texting. It paid $161,000 to Yoav Davis, who runs the Jews of NY Instagram account, and $900,000 to Bridges Partners to compensate more than a dozen influencers, none of whom registered as foreign agents, according to the paper.
