trump: The phone call that exposed cracks in the Trump-Netanyahu bond
But a harsh phone call this week in which the president called the prime minister “fucking crazy,” first leaked to the media and then publicly confirmed by Trump himself, laid bare the occasional tensions between the two leaders.
Israeli officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged that the meeting was one of the most heated conversations the prime minister has had with Trump. One of the officials said the leak damaged Netanyahu politically ahead of national elections this year.
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US website Axios published news of the call on Monday, saying Trump angrily confronted Netanyahu over Israel’s threat to resume airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs. Trump was recorded as saying, “Everyone hates you now. That’s why everyone hates Israel.”
The US president told Netanyahu not to target Beirut after Iran warned that Israeli attacks in Lebanon were undermining talks to end the war, which began with joint US-Israeli strikes and is unpopular among Americans.
Think-Tank President: US-ISRAEL DIFFERENCES ‘ARE VERY PUBLIC NOW’
A senior Israeli official told Reuters that Netanyahu made clear to Trump that any pause in Israel’s plans to strike Beirut would only work if Hezbollah stopped striking northern Israel. Trump accepted that position, the official said. Following his calls, Trump said Israel and Hezbollah had agreed to stop shooting at each other, leading to accusations from Netanyahu’s political opponents and some within his own government that Netanyahu was ceding Israel’s sovereignty to the United States.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid said, “Complete patronage” and claimed that Netanyahu turned Israel into a client state of America.
Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, has repeatedly clashed with Republican and Democratic administrations. But Israel remains Washington’s closest Middle East ally.
Nimrod Goren, president of Mitvim, an Israeli think tank, said that unlike differences in the past that were managed quietly behind closed doors, “the differences are now very clear.”
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Trump told the New York Post on Wednesday that he was “a little bit annoyed” by Netanyahu’s constant attacks on Lebanon, but added: “We worked very well together.”
Trump’s decision to join Israel in striking Iran not once but twice a year appeared to mark a major victory for Netanyahu, who for decades has been encouraging Washington to use its military might to stop Tehran’s nuclear program.
But Trump has also taken a number of steps that many in Israel see as contrary to the country’s interests, including ending U.S. strikes against the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen, lifting sanctions against Syrian President Ahmed al-Shara, and ordering a halt to Israel’s 12-day war with Iran in June 2025.
ISRAEL IS NOT DIRECTLY PARTICIPATING IN THE US-IRAN PEACE TALKS
While the United States and Israel launched a joint campaign against Iran in February, Israel was not directly involved in US-Iran talks aimed at ending the war. These negotiations were conducted through Pakistan, a rare intermediary without formal diplomatic ties with Israel.
The wars with Iran and Hezbollah are hugely popular in Israel, including among supporters of Netanyahu’s political rivals, and much of the public wants the conflict to continue.
This is in stark contrast to the United States, where many voters, including members of Trump’s conservative base, oppose the war.
Trump has repeatedly said the United States is close to an agreement to end the war with Iran. Tehran insists any deal would include Israel halting attacks on its ally Hezbollah in Lebanon.
“We are being forced to stand on the ground,” said Israeli pollster Mitchell Barak. “We no longer have a say in the matter.”
At the beginning of this year’s war with Iran, Netanyahu said that the Iranian government would be overthrown and its nuclear and missile programs would be destroyed. He also said Hezbollah, which attacked Israel in March in support of Iran, should be disarmed in southern Lebanon. So far, none of these goals have been achieved.
Recent domestic polls have repeatedly shown that Netanyahu’s coalition government, the most right-wing in the country’s history, will not win a majority in the next election.
Goren said Netanyahu is working to meet Trump’s demands because the Israeli prime minister will need the president’s support close to the election, including a possible visit by the US leader to Israel. Before the war with Iran, Trump was expected to visit Israel in April and receive the state’s highest civilian honor. Last visited in October.
FORMER ADVISER SAYS TRUMP-NETANYAHU CONFLICT IS EXAMINED
However, Goren said some Israelis are uncomfortable with Trump’s ability to influence Israel’s military decisions. By contrast, some critics of Trump in the United States say Netanyahu wields too much influence over U.S. foreign policy.
There are times when an Israeli leader should know how to say “no” even to the US president, Netanyahu’s national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said on Thursday.
Nadav Shtrauchler, one of Netanyahu’s former advisors, said that the Israeli prime minister trusts Trump’s support in the elections.
“The way the war ends (with Iran and Hezbollah) will affect the outcome of the election more than anything else.”
Trump has frequently praised Netanyahu publicly and publicly lobbied Israel’s president to pardon the prime minister, who is on trial in Israel on corruption-related charges.
But Trump has also publicly emphasized how much Israel needs Washington and said he has used expletives when talking about Israel in the past; This includes last year when he publicly stated that Israel and Iran “don’t know what the hell they’re doing.”
Netanyahu, for his part, calls Trump “the greatest friend Israel has ever had in the White House” and offers resounding praise for the Republican president known to value personal loyalty and approval.
Since the United States and Israel launched a war against Iran, Netanyahu has at times said that he speaks with Trump almost every day, describing their relationship with the Israeli public as one between two brothers who make decisions together.
Asked about the call in an interview with CNBC on Wednesday, Netanyahu said there were sometimes “tactical disagreements” with the US president, as in “the best families.”
A U.S. official told Reuters the phone call was one of several in which the president spoke fairly directly to Netanyahu, but the two remained friends and close allies.
“Their speech is quite direct,” the official said.
The official and another Israeli source briefed on the US-Israel relationship rejected any suggestion of a material change in the relationship between Netanyahu and Trump.
However, the Israeli source acknowledged that the leak of the call and Trump’s subsequent approval of it did not help Netanyahu ahead of the election, which he plans to lose.
Shtrauchler, a former adviser to Netanyahu, said the perception of disagreement with Trump was exaggerated and that the two leaders still see eye to eye on most important issues.
But he said an abrupt end to the wars with Iran and Hezbollah would pose a “huge problem”: for Netanyahu, he said, many Israelis would see it as Trump forcing his hand.
“Nobody here wants to feel like we’re just another star on the U.S. flag. We want to feel our independence,” Shtrauchler said. he said.
