"Who did what for Israel in 1948? America did nothing."

[The Magistrate]

1. It is An Odd Bit, Sir

The Soviets supported Israel on two levels. A degree of hostility between the Zionists and England post-war led to their adopting the view Israel might prove a wedge against English domination in the Near East ( it is worth remembering that, at the time, Egypt and Iraq, as well as Trans-Jordan, were essentially English clients, and no one considered this likely to change any time soon in 1948 ). Further, Zionism was definitely a left Socialist movement at the time, and the Soviets had a good deal of experience at taking left parties over from within and turning them to their own purposes. So Israel seemed, to the Soviets, to at least open the possibility of a cat's paw against the English totally under their control in the Near East.

The thing broke apart more under the pressure of Stalin's last purge, the 'Doctor's Purge', which took on a decidedly anti-semitic character. Relations between the U.S. and Israel remained fairly distant until after the Suez Crisis. Well into the sixties, France was the principal supplier of weapons to Israel.