Not even Trump can stand in Netanyahu's way
The Israeli military may have carried out a highly impressive operation to destroy and degrade Iran's key nuclear facilities, as well as liquidating several top nuclear scientists and commanders in the regime's intelligence and security establishment, but not even the Israelis could summon the firepower to take out two of Iran's key nuclear targets, the underground enrichment facilities at Natanz and Fordow. Trump's decision, therefore, to authorise US air strikes against the heavily-fortified compounds, using fourteen 30,000lb Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPS) to destroy the facilities, provided a vital boost to the Israeli offensive.
And even though the jury is still out about how much damage the Americans inflicted on Iran's nuclear programme – there are already suggestions that Iran has resumed work on enriching uranium – Trump clearly believes his military contribution helped the Israelis to achieve their military objectives in Operation Rising Lion, their codename for the Iran attack.
Now, having forced Tehran and Jerusalem to observe a ceasefire, Trump has turned his attention to Gaza. This is a president who, after all, has set his sights on winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Ending the war in Gaza – together with resolving the conflict in Ukraine – have been two of Trump's main foreign policy objectives since returning to the White House.
While his efforts in Ukraine have been frustrated by Putin's marked lack of interest in a ceasefire, the White House has enjoyed a modicum of success in Gaza, where it did succeed in establishing a short-lived break in the fighting earlier this year. The most notable elements of that deal were the exchange of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners, and the easing of humanitarian aid for Gaza's battered civilian population.
The ceasefire collapsed at the end of March amid mutual recriminations, with Israel resuming its military offensive against Hamas terrorists.
Buoyed by his successful intervention in the Israel-Iran conflict, Trump believes now is the time to strike a new ceasefire deal, which would be based on similar terms to the previous agreement implemented earlier this year. In return for the staggered release of Israeli hostages – both dead and alive – hundreds of Palestinian prisoners will be freed from Israeli jails, aid supplies will resume and Israel will be expected to begin a phased withdrawal from territory it has occupied in the enclave.
While Netanyahu can be expected to accept the hostages-for-prisoners formula, and ease aid restrictions, he will be more resistant to the notion of any military withdrawal from Gaza so long as any vestige remains intact.
Thus, while Trump has sought to pre-empt the outcome of his meeting with Netanyahu by announcing that Israel has already agreed to the 'necessary conditions' to finalise a 60-day ceasefire, there will nonetheless be concerns at the White House that the Israeli premier will not be prepared to commit to any form of military withdrawal until Hamas's presence in Gaza has been fully eradicated. This was Israel's key military objective in the wake of the October 7 attacks in 2023, and remains so to this day.
While the US and Israel have forged an effective alliance in combatting Iran's nuclear infrastructure, on a personal level tensions remain between Trump and Netanyahu, who have not always enjoyed the easiest of relationships. Trump has privately accused Netanyahu of being ungrateful for the backing he receives from Washington, especially after the key role Trump played during his first term negotiating the Abraham Accords, which saw several Arab states normalise relations with Israel.
These tensions memorably erupted in public after Trump accused both Israel and Iran of breaching the ceasefire terms he arranged at the end of the Iran conflict in June, claiming that they 'don't know what the f*** they are doing'. Using expletives to describe Iran's conduct is nothing new for Trump – he used the F-word about Iran in 2020. But using it in relation to a country that is supposed to be one of Washington's closest allies showed that not even Netanyahu is immune from Trump's temper tantrums.
The risk of upsetting Trump, and provoking one of his famous Oval Office outbursts, will therefore be one of Netanyahu's foremost concerns during his Washington visit, as will be his desire to ensure that he ultimately achieves his goal of destroying Hamas in Gaza.
One important consequence of the US-Israel military attack on Iran is that Tehran is no longer in a position to maintain its support for Hamas's terrorist activities, placing the terrorist organisation in its weakest position since the October 7 attacks.
With Hamas on the ropes, Netanyahu will remain committed to achieving his ultimate goal of destroying the organisation once and for all, even if it means upsetting his White House host.
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