There have been ongoing reports and speculations about a potential conflict between President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. These rumors have emerged alongside Trump and his administration’s vigorous attempts to negotiate peace agreements or ceasefires with the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, as well as the Yemeni Islamist political and military Houthi rebels.
Nevertheless, Trump’s Special Envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, addressed these rumors in an exclusive interview with Breitbart News at the White House last week. He described the claims of a falling-out between the leaders as “preposterous.”
I’ll tell you, firstly, it seems we share a similar mindset that leads us to dismiss half of these reports, so perhaps we should disregard even more than half. I believe this report will prove to be exceedingly accurate, but Prime Minister Netanyahu and the Israeli people are unwavering allies of the United States, and this sentiment is reciprocated.
I’ve been at multiple meetings with the president and the Prime Minister—they’re friendly. They’re good friends in fact. That doesn’t mean they agree on absolutely everything and I think that’s the tendency, right? You have a newspaper person who hears about a small disagreement about something that normal human beings like me and you would pay no attention to, but that particular newspaper reporter then conflates that into some large article about some massive issues that they have? It’s preposterous.Â
Israel is a great partner for the United States, strategically, economically, we think very much alike, we have very similar objectives. They don’t want to see a weaponized nuclear state in the state of Iran. And so, I don’t think there’s much daylight between how they think and how we think from a foreign policy perspective.
But as I reported on May 8, after four years of former President Joe Biden throwing Netanyahu and the Jewish state under the bus at every opportunity in deference to Gazan Palestinians as the Israel-Hamas war raged on, Netanyahu was likely beyond relieved after Trump won the 2024 presidential election. Â
Now, less than four months after Trump’s inauguration, Netanyahu declared last Wednesday that “Israel will defend itself by itself” after Trump on Tuesday announced that the U.S. had reached a ceasefire deal between Yemen’s Houthis that doesn’t include Israel, which is also at war with the Houthis.Â
First of all, we are dealing with it, and the rule that I have set is: Israel will defend itself by itself. We are doing this in Yemen, we are doing this in other places, and the distances are very great. Israel has a long arm, and we will deploy it. If others join us, our American friends – all the better. If they don’t join – we will defend ourselves by ourselves.
