Like most in our community, we were greatly concerned by those news reports of a growing estrangement between President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, stemming from an apparent dispute over Iran policy. Publicly disagreeing with President Trump on one of his signature issues has usually proven to be a risky business.
The most prevalent spin is that President Trump still thinks that he can come to a serious agreement with Iran ending its nuclear weapons program and is pursuing negotiations, while Prime Minister Netanyahu argues that such a deal cannot reasonably be made, and that it is more than past the time for military action.
Meanwhile, the media is having a field day speculating about how deep the division is and what it portends for future relations between Israel and the U.S. Last week the New York Times breathlessly reported, “The clash over how best to ensure that Iran cannot produce a nuclear weapon has led to at least one tense phone call between President Trump and Mr. Netanyahu and a flurry of meetings in recent days between top administration officials and senior Israeli officials….”
The Times went on to note in particular that “Mr. Trump acknowledged that he had warned Mr. Netanyahu about launching an attack while negotiations were underway.”
But we find it hard to believe President Trump would really be upset with the Israeli threats to bomb Iranian nuclear sites. In fact, to paraphrase an old adage, if Netanyahu did not so threaten, Trump would ask him to. As we see it, the more Iran is made to believe that Israel is chomping at the bit for an opportunity to attack but is only being held back by President Trump’s opposition, the greater the chances that Iran will make a deal to Trump’s liking. And to boot, Mr. Netanyahu has lately taken to threatening an attack even without U.S. help.
To be sure, if Israel actually does attack, the calculus might change and that may, indeed, occur relatively soon. But for now, we think that there is a wink and a nod understanding between the President and the Prime Minister.
We also think that Trump and Netanyahu are not alone in this. According to Times of Israel reporting, just as the issue is reaching a boiling point, seemingly out of nowhere comes the news that at a meeting in Teheran last month, Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister bluntly warned Iran’s leadership that they must take President Trump’s offer to negotiate a nuclear deal seriously in order to avoid war with Israel.
We trust that neither President Trump nor Prime Minister Netanyahu will get sidetracked from following through on their firm public commitments to do all that is necessary to thwart Iran’s efforts to become a nuclear power. We can think of no more urgent goal.
