This time, Trump and Netanyahu have really fallen out - Financial Times

This time, Trump and Netanyahu have really fallen out

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Opinion

Middle East war

This time, Trump and Netanyahu have really fallen out

Rarely has a geopolitical roll of the dice gone so rapidly wrong as the Israeli PM’s

* Edward Luce
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!Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Donald Trump stand talking outside the White House near a garden.

*Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu played on Donald Trump’s vanity to help convince him to start this war, but wooing back the US president will be a challenge

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Edward Luce

Published8 hours ago

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Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world

Put yourself in Donald Trump’s shoes. It was his 80th birthday and he was planning to cap White House festivities with his US-Iran deal. The agreement nearly unravelled, however, when Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a Sunday evening strike on Beirut. A flurry of White House calls averted Iranian retaliation. Assurances were given via mediators and the deal was saved. Trump’s late Rome-flavoured cage fight could go ahead.

But Trump was still in a foul mood. “Why did Bibi have to do a fucking attack?” he told Axios. “I was so pissed off. I let him know. He has no fucking judgment. I let him know that.” The answer to Trump’s question is that his Iran deal is likely to be a political death sentence for Netanyahu. He thus has every incentive to reignite Gulf war III. He has bet his own and Israel’s future on getting Trump to bring about regime change in Iran. That bet has exploded in his face.

Wooing back Trump will be a challenge. Going by the adage “fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me”, the US president has grounds to feel burned by Israel’s prime minister. As does the electorate in Israel, which will have a general election by the end of October.

Netanyahu sold Trump and his own public on the idea that, after 47 years, Iran’s theocrats were finally meeting their Waterloo. All Operation Epic Fury required was some lethal targeting and the Iranian people would do the rest.

Rarely has a geopolitical roll of the dice gone so rapidly wrong. Netanyahu played on Trump’s vanity to help convince him to start this war. That same vanity will now be deaf to any future bridges Netanyahu might try to sell. The Israeli leader thus faces an unpalatable choice. Either he submits to a deal that leaves Iran considerably stronger than it was before February 28, or he breaks with the US by trying to scupper the deal. There is little scope here to split the difference. Netanyahu has the 60-day US-Iran negotiating period to figure it out.

He will have fewer allies in Washington than before. In the