'Mr. Security': Inside Amir Baram's mission to secure Israel's military future, defense ties

Amir Baram has seen it all.He has served in either the IDF or in his current role as the Defense Ministry’s director-general for 38 years.Baram has been stationed or fought in Lebanon, Gaza, and the West Bank, including in covert missions behind enemy lines.Though not as tall as some other top Israeli generals, his deep convictions, encyclopedic knowledge of defense issues, and self-confidence are apparent within moments.A self-styled maverick at times, Baram, in 2012, reinstated full brigade parachute training, leading a team in its first full parachute exercise in 15 years.But maybe his greatest challenge has been taking over as the Defense Ministry’s top apolitical official in early 2025 and traveling worldwide ever since to maintain Israel’s defense interests amid the roughest diplomatic environment for Israel in decades.BARAM VISITS the 9900th Unit, the IDF’s visual intelligence and geospatial division, accompanied by the unit’s commander, Brig.-Gen. ‘S,’ and the head of the Space Directorate within the Defense Ministry’s Directorate of Defense, Research & Development, Avi Berger, last week. (credit: COURTESY DEFENSE MINISTRY)US-MOUBaram is the lead negotiator for Israel’s upcoming memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the US to transform a defense aid arrangement into a defense partnership for 2028-2038.On the one hand, he no longer needs to convince Washington to provide “aid to little Israel,” a country that has matured into a regional economic power.On the other hand, Baram has no real blueprint he can follow regarding structuring the new partnership, given that all prior MOUs dating back to the 1980s were “aid MOUs.”Timing matters for the MOU.Israel has been trying to accelerate the talks with the Trump administration regarding the MOU, beginning with what was supposed to be a return visit to Washington last week by Israeli officials. But the visit has been indefinitely delayed, The Jerusalem Post has learned.Despite Israeli efforts to advance the talks, the pace of negotiations has been so slow that it is unclear whether Israel will be able to secure a renewed MOU before a new US Congress takes office in January, the Post understands.For decades, the MOU, which was regularly renewed and updated once a decade, was the primary strategic document governing US military assistance and relations with Israel.If the MOU is not signed by January, any new agreement could face heightened opposition from what is likely to be a Democrat-controlled House of Representatives and possibly even a Democrat-controlled Senate. And it seems that the ongoing Iran conflict and other issues have again pushed off even talking about the deal at this stage.On April 16, 40 out of 47 Democratic senators voted to block various weapon sales to Israel. Then, on July 15, a plurality of Congress Democrats – 103 out of 212 – supported a budget amendment to immediately halt the $3.3 billion in annual foreign military funding guaranteed to Israel by the US administration.Given this state of play, a change in control of one or both houses of the US Congress could significantly impact the MOU, even as the US executive branch can make certain foreign policy decisions on its own.Originally, Israel had expected the talks to progress at a steady pace at the start of 2026, defense sources have told the Post. The war with Iran delayed that process until April. After that, the plan was for the talks to charge forward in May.It appears that the shakiness of the post-Iran war period and the conflict in Lebanon have distracted the US administration.Alternatively, the delay might also stem from the politics of perception of military assistance or even partnerships with Israel, which have radically changed in America in recent years, leading the talks to drag on until now.Israel had hoped to lock in the MOU before Israeli elections and prior to American midterm elections. Now, the best-case scenario might be signing a new MOU after both elections occur, but in the two months before the new US Congress takes office. Even that scenario is now viewed as a long shot.It is even less clear whether Israel will succeed in getting the Trump administration to sign on to a long-term overlapping defense agreement through 2048.This uncertainty is reflected in the fact that official ministry materials also acknowledge the possibility of maintaining Israel-US defense relations on a more ad hoc basis, without long-term documents as an anchor.Amir Baram stands with Aviv Kohavi and incoming Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, October 31st, 2022. (credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON UNIT)Weapons independence and debate on longer warsThis is not the only major issue Baram must juggle.Part of what he is trying to construct is a way for the MOU to work in light of a fresh Israeli push to produce both its own “dumb bombs” and also precision bombs in much larger volumes than ever before.That push for more Israeli-produced bombs of all kinds is meant to generate greater Israeli independence in that area, as well as to continue a doctrinal shift toward being ready to fight longer wars.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he would allocate $350b. over 10 years toward achieving greater weapons independence.Baram is tasked with making sure he actually gets those funds from the Finance Ministry, which will doubtlessly try to cut them back, and with figuring out how to use them.He also needs to keep the defense establishment on board with the new mentality.A rising number of former senior defense officials have slammed the length of the recent wars Israel was involved in and have demanded Jerusalem return to shorter wars.Their argument is that Israel remains too small militarily, geographically, population-wise, economically, and in terms of diplomatic support, to fight longer wars.On July 1, Baram publicly rebuked this view as unrealistic, saying that the IDF must be ready for this style of long war, regardless of convenience.This does not mean that Israel may not try to fight future wars in a shorter way than the post-October 7 wars. But Baram is convinced that the Jewish state must have the ability to continue firing for longer if necessary.He is also not an optimist about how long a break Israel will get between wars in the near future.Already back in September 2025, only months after the June 2025 war with Iran, Baram correctly predicted another war with Tehran at the Ministry of Finance Accountant General Conference, stating, “Operation Rising Lion concluded with an unequivocal Israeli victory, yet additional confrontations with Iran are inevitable.”“The Iranian regime, operating from a position of strategic humiliation, is massively investing in security infrastructure and pursuing accelerated force-building initiatives,” he said.Other alliesThe US is the most important piece of the foreign defense policy. Baram is managing this.That said, one major area exhibiting a problematic shift is Europe.In some respects, sales of Israeli defense products to Europe remain strong in many areas. Selling Arrow 3 to Germany, for instance, set new records for defense sales.Alternatively, sales dropped in Europe between 2024 and 2025.Defense sources have said that this was mostly due to an unusual uptick the year before for the Arrow missile system sale and a small number of other large sales, but that, in comparison to 2023, Israeli sales with Europe remained steady.Defense sources said this was true despite many European countries, especially France, sending mixed signals about their willingness to buy and sell defense products to Israel as a result of disagreements over its handling of the wars in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran.There is another challenge.Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Kyiv became one of the most innovative producers of new defense technologies and is just as or even more battle-proven with certain platforms as Israel.Moreover, if, half a decade ago, few European countries were willing to spend large sums on building their own defense sectors, after Russia continued to threaten Ukraine and Europe, many nations have since built up their defense sectors. They do not necessarily need Israeli weapons.Although sometimes Israeli defense products are superior, these countries occasionally decide to use their own local products as “good enough” and cheaper.Addressing France specifically, the Defense Ministry in June said Paris was not only partially boycotting Israel’s defense sector due to delegitimization concerns related to the Middle East wars.However, the ministry also explicitly accused the French military of trying to undermine Israel as one of its tough competitors in various areas of defense.French President Emmanuel Macron halted the flow of French weapons to Israel in late 2024, citing the humanitarian toll of the war in Gaza. For the past three years, France has blocked or limited the participation of Israeli defense companies at arms fairs in the country.The Post has pressed top defense sources about whether Israel can afford to be in such open conflict with France, including with Jerusalem having canceled the visit of a senior French defense delegation to Israel in response to France partially boycotting Israel’s defense sector.Certain defense sources have responded with a long-term analysis of a potential French decline. France’s Muslim population is around 10% of the population now, and is expected to grow to close to 20% or more by 2050, especially given that many non-Muslim French citizens are not currently having many children.Not all, but most of the French-Muslim population tends to be anti-Israel and sometimes also anti-Western. This, along with looming massive economic deficits, has led to a new round of media coverage centering around the question of whether France is governable.In March, Baram said he had “decided to reduce all defense procurement from France to zero, replacing it with domestic Israeli purchases from [other] allied countries.”Can the defense industry maintain itself if it is on the outs with France and a variety of other European countries?First of all, various Eastern European and other countries continue to carry out significant defense commerce with Israel.But under Baram, Israel has also greatly expanded its relations with countries such as India, Greece, Cyprus, and the UAE.If Israeli-Indian relations included Jerusalem selling New Delhi systems, like the Barak 8 medium-range air defense system, before February of this year, the new MOU with India was part of striking or leading to striking new deals.These included Rafael’s SPICE 1000 guidance kits and Ice Breaker naval cruise missiles, Elbit Systems’ Rampage air-to-ground missiles, and Israel Aerospace Industries’ supersonic Air LORA missiles.Baram has been working on using the new Israel-India MOU as a platform to lead to a broader shift in relations between the two countries.The goal is to shift from a traditional buyer-seller relationship toward joint production and technology development throughout the life of a new weapons system.Ahead of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Israel earlier this year, the government approved a $40 million program to expand bilateral cooperation across multiple sectors.It eventually agreed to the joint development of next-generation technologies and emergency procurement mechanisms during conflict periods.According to a Forbes India report, Israel agreed to $8.6b. in arms deals with India in 2026. This came after the Defense Ministry’s International Defense Cooperation Directorate had said that total arms sales to India from 2020 to 2024 were worth around $20.5b.Producing Rafael’s Tamir interceptors locally in India would be another step in that evolution, shifting the relationship toward even greater shared industrial production.Sources close to Baram have said that Israel is ready to share top-level secrets with India because, after the May 2024 partial weapons embargo from the US, Israeli defense policy needs additional anchors based on deep, intertwined, long-term interests.This in no way suggests a reduction in sharing with the US.In fact, Baram’s view would be that a TOT – a transfer of strategic technology – to America in certain defense areas is a critical piece of getting the Trump administration and future administrations to share their superiority in the field of AI.While many experts view Israel as a cybersecurity superpower, it entered the race for AI prowess much later than the US, China, and others, and has far fewer energy resources, land, and other critical elements to be even a mid-level AI power.Help from the US in this area is critical. Meanwhile, AI bureau chief Brig.-Gen. (res.) Erez Askal, and the communications and technology commander within the IDF’s Computer Service Directorate, Brig.-Gen. Yael Grossman, as well as others, are working on sharpening specific areas of AI expertise where Israel can shine.IDF Deputy Chief of Staff Maj.-Gen. Amir Baram attends a ceremony held at the IDF Central Command headquarters in Jerusalem, July 8, 2024 (credit: OREN BEN HAKOON/FLASH90)Wounded soldiersOn July 16, the government announced that it had approved a comprehensive reform for handling the massive spike in wounded and emotionally traumatized soldiers from the last three years of war.The reform is based on the June 7 recommendations of a government committee headed by Prof. Shlomo Mor Yosef.This week, the government decision is already locked in, as history has been made. Notably, Baram was one of the leading campaigners against the Finance Ministry’s strong resistance to making this revolution happen.Immediately after the government approval came through, Baram said, “The decision made by the government tonight is more than just a structural change.”“It is a declaration of national intent to place rehabilitation at the top of Israel’s priorities ... Implementing this reform is not just another duty of management for me, but rather a personal command obligation,” he said.When Baram speaks about the issue, one can see he has a special burning passion for it.That committee issued recommendations to the Defense and Finance Ministries for radical changes to the handling of 50,000 emotional trauma cases of former IDF soldiers.Mor Yosef, whose committee started operating in November 2025, said that such a panel should have been established at least a year earlier to deal with the skyrocketing numbers of physically wounded and emotionally traumatized, including post-traumatic stress disorder cases from the ongoing wars since October 2023.While in March 2025 the ministry estimated it would reach 100,000 total wounded soldiers by around 2030, as the war has continued and the number of wounded soldiers in Lebanon has jumped, the new estimate for crossing that threshold has been moved back to 2028.The committee said that though the ministry had already made many changes to streamline the approval of financial benefits and emotional treatment for soldiers, compared to prior to October 7, the changes are nowhere near sufficient.Instead, the committee said that the ministry must establish a new, almost completely independent authority to handle the issue.In terms of budgets, the panel said that while the budget for this issue has already jumped from around NIS 5b. to NIS 10b. when comparing 2023 to 2026, another NIS 2b. per year is probably necessary, along with a one-time investment of more than NIS 500m. in establishing the new authority.With his sterling record, this is probably not Baram’s last stop in public service for the State of Israel.Some have marked him as a potential heir apparent to Eyal Zamir as IDF chief when Zamir completes his term in March 2028 or 2029.Current IDF deputy chief Maj.-Gen. Tamir Yadai and former IDF Northern Command chief Maj.-Gen. Ori Gordin will also be in the running. Baram’s recent achievements in the Defense Ministry have not hurt his chances.