As he sat next to President Trump on Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel had a grin on his face that he rarely had during the last administration. And why not? He got most everything he came to Washington for.
Put aside the president’s far-fetched notion of a U.S. takeover of Gaza. Mr. Trump made clear that he had no intention of pressing Mr. Netanyahu as President Joseph R. Biden Jr. did at times since the Israeli leader returned to power in 2022.
In fact, Mr. Netanyahu’s mere presence in the White House was a sign of how much has changed. Mr. Biden did not host the prime minister at the executive mansion until last July, more than 18 months into Mr. Netanyahu’s latest term and six months before the end of his own. By contrast, Mr. Trump made Mr. Netanyahu the first foreign leader he has invited since his own return to power a little over two weeks ago.
During their meetings, Mr. Trump indicated that he would not try to stop Israel from continuing to wage war against Hamas even at the expense of the temporary cease-fire now in effect. Just before Mr. Netanyahu’s arrival at the White House on Tuesday, Mr. Trump signed an order reinstating “maximum pressure” on Iran and later, with the Israeli leader at his side, vowed again to prevent Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Mr. Trump also recommitted to brokering a diplomatic rapprochement between Israel and Saudi Arabia, a potentially legacy-making priority for Mr. Netanyahu, while dropping any support for a Palestinian state, something the prime minister has rejected despite pressure from the Saudis and others. He has also canceled sanctions imposed by Mr. Biden on violent West Bank settlers and is poised to release weapons held up by the former president.
“All of the hoopla on the U.S. taking over Gaza caused us to miss the real story from the meeting,” said Aaron David Miller, a longtime Middle East peace negotiator now at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “Bibi leaves the White House among the happiest humans on the planet. If there ever was a demonstration of no daylight between Israel and the U.S., this was it.”
Mr. Netanyahu alluded to the tension with Mr. Biden during his meeting with Mr. Trump. Despite his strong support for Israel over a half-century in public life and particularly after the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack by Hamas that killed 1,200 people, Mr. Biden periodically pushed the Israeli leader to do more to avoid civilian casualties in Gaza, alleviate the humanitarian crisis there and bring the war to an end. Mr. Netanyahu resisted and made clear on Tuesday how happy he was that Mr. Biden was gone.
“When Israel and the United States work together — and President Trump and I work together, you know — the chances go up a lot” for success, Mr. Netanyahu said in the Oval Office. “It’s when we don’t work together, Israel and the United States don’t work together, that creates problems. When the other side sees daylight between us — and occasionally in the last few years, to put it mildly, they saw daylight — then it’s more difficult.”
At another point, Mr. Netanyahu was asked who deserved more credit for the cease-fire agreement reached last month, Mr. Biden or Mr. Trump. Mr. Biden first put the cease-fire deal on the table and his team spent months negotiating all the details, but Mr. Trump’s pressure at the end forced the negotiators to finally sign off.
In response to the question, Mr. Netanyahu praised Mr. Trump’s “great force and powerful leadership” and said nothing about Mr. Biden.
The duet sung by the two leaders papered over the rift that developed during the final year of Mr. Trump’s first term, when he bristled at what he considered Mr. Netanyahu’s presumption and erupted when the Israeli leader congratulated Mr. Biden on his victory in the 2020 election.
But there were still a couple of discordant notes. It was somewhat surreal to listen to Mr. Trump repeatedly lament all the “death and destruction” wrought on the Palestinian people in Gaza while sitting next to the prime minister who gave the orders for the war that has killed 47,000 people, according to Gaza health authorities.
The two also gave different assessments of Iran’s strength. Mr. Netanyahu boasted of everything that he has done in the past 16 months to damage Iran and its proxy forces Hamas and Hezbollah. “The Iran terror axis has never been weaker,” he said.
But that does not fit the narrative Mr. Trump has been pushing. He has been arguing that Mr. Biden was too soft on Iran, which in this version has grown ever more powerful during the past four years. “They’re not weak,” Mr. Trump insisted. “They’re very strong right now.”
Still, those disparities went largely unnoticed amid the bonhomie. Two leaders, both of whom have faced criminal trials, both of whom have recaptured office after being defeated, relished their renewed alignment and did all they could to avoid any daylight.
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