The American press has described the telephone exchange between the American president and the Israeli Prime Minister on Tuesday as “heated”. At the heart of this dispute: a disagreement on the strategy to adopt towards Iran, according to several sources close to the matter cited by the media Axios. Benyamin Netanyahu reportedly strongly criticized the diplomatic path, currently favored by Donald Trump. “Bibi was furious,” one of them confided.
These disputes are nothing new, but the tension seems to have escalated between the two men. Israel has long expressed skepticism about the idea that Iran would uphold any agreement aimed at dismantling its nuclear program and refraining from attacking countries in the region. But Benyamin Netanyahu vigorously reiterated these arguments during Tuesday’s call and during a previous meeting on Sunday, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Differences on war objectives between Washington and Tel Aviv:
On the other hand, Donald Trump is seeking to end an expensive and unpopular war economically in the United States. And his position on Tuesday was not exactly the same as on Sunday. While Trump initially indicated that he was considering launching new targeted attacks on Iran, an operation dubbed “Hammer”, he later backed down at the request of his Gulf allies, CNN reveals. Despite various testimonies in this regard, Trump denied any disagreement with his Israeli counterpart, even going so far as to assure, the day after the call, that the call went smoothly and stating, regarding Benyamin Netanyahu: “He will do whatever I want him to do”.
But Tel Aviv seems determined to do everything to block the adoption of an agreement that does not resolve the nuclear issue. “If the Americans get an agreement in which all enriched uranium is exported and enrichment facilities dismantled, then from the Israeli perspective, it’s a good agreement,” analyzes Yaakov Amidror, a researcher at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, in the Wall Street Journal. “If it’s a bad agreement, Israel will do everything it can to prevent its implementation.”
Iranian uranium and the Strait of Hormuz remain sticking points:
This week has been marked by intense diplomatic activity on the Iranian issue, involving Pakistan and Qatar. Mediators have reported little progress in the negotiations at the beginning of the week, with the United States and Iran each sticking to firm positions without any real sign of compromise regarding the nuclear issue, the Strait of Hormuz, or the easing of sanctions.
Reuters, citing two high-ranking Iranian sources, reported that Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei had ordered that the country’s stocks of enriched uranium not be exported. This information was promptly denied by a US official, who stated that no such directive had been communicated to the White House Thursday morning in the United States. When asked on Thursday about the possibility of Iran keeping its highly enriched uranium, Donald Trump was adamant: “No, no, we will retrieve it. And he added: “We don’t need it; we don’t want it. We will probably destroy it after retrieving it.”
Some analysts, however, believe that a protocol agreement deferring the most difficult issues could be conceivable thanks to a few basic compromises. “There are encouraging signs, but I don’t want to be too optimistic,” said Secretary of State Marco Rubio to journalists in Florida on Thursday, before his departure for Sweden and India. Meanwhile, Donald Trump continues to threaten a resumption of military actions, even if he seems determined to avoid it behind the scenes. “If we don’t get the right answers, things can escalate quickly. We are all ready to go back to war,” he assured on Wednesday.
