Inside Trump and Netanyahu’s complicated relationship

As President Trump tries to permanently end his war in Iran, which has battered the U.S. economy and kept gas prices above $4 a gallon, he had choice words for the partner who implored him to get involved.

“Why are you blowing up buildings?” Trump asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about Lebanon in a recent phone call, people familiar with the call said. “Stop blowing up buildings.” In another, he complained that the global recession caused by the war could link him to Herbert Hoover and the Great Depression of the 1930s, the people said.

Trump’s frustration with Netanyahu has risen several times in recent weeks as he has tried to end the war with Iran and the Israeli prime minister has tried to keep the fight going. The relationship will have major implications for a region on the cusp of a potential peace deal, whose future could be jeopardized by further Israeli military attacks.

In a memorandum of understanding, Tehran agreed to a trade: Iran fully reopened the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for ending the US blockade and allowing Tehran to sell its oil on the market. Both sides left tough negotiations over ending Iran’s nuclear work for the next 60 days.

According to Israeli officials, Israeli officials were surprised by the ceasefire announced on Thursday and had assessed that Trump was leaning more towards military strikes rather than any agreement. One person said Israeli officials were prepared for possible attacks.

“Donald, how do you verify this?” Netanyahu asked about the nuclear weapons provisions of a potential deal on a recent call, according to people with direct knowledge of the call. On other calls, he gave reasons for not trusting the Iranians on history.

Trump has told his advisers that no one can handle Netanyahu, and he wants to “bomb everyone,” according to a person who heard his remarks.

In a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, Trump said of Netanyahu, “I think he’s great, but sometimes he gets carried away.”

A senior administration official with knowledge of Trump’s call to Netanyahu said it typically involves Israeli leaders arguing for more military action, and said Trump was tired of it.

“Bibi tells the president why he needs to explode something, and why Israeli intelligence knows how to do it, and when to do it, and the president listens,” the person said. “The calls are usually the same.”

As Trump has talked about the need to reopen the strait, Netanyahu has encouraged him to tell the Iranians to wait and see if it continues.

After hearing last week that Trump was going to sign a deal sidelining Israel, Netanyahu requested an urgent meeting with him, a person familiar with the matter said. A few days later, a draft of the deal was shown to Israeli officials.

On Sunday, Trump said in the interview that the Israelis would like the deal, even though he has indicated otherwise and has not yet seen it. He said there are clear limits to the relationship, and Netanyahu “asks for permission”, a public humiliation for the Israeli leader.

“They call us big and they call us small,” Trump said.

Administration officials said the fickle nature of their relationship sometimes led to internal disagreements, with Netanyahu regularly seeking Trump’s approval but sometimes striking the target first.

Using Netanyahu’s nickname, Nathan Sachs, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, said, “Bibi fears Trump will turn on him, but he also sees Trump as a man who can be convinced to do anything, including attacking Iran.”

Trump administration officials have become disappointed with the Israeli leader. Administration officials said some White House officials have asked whether Netanyahu has tried to prolong the Iran war to strengthen his political position. Israeli officials have also attacked some of Trump’s advisers, believing they were feeding them negative information about the country.

Netanyahu faces tough elections in the autumn, with polls showing he has failed to win a ruling majority. Trump had previously come to his aid, asking for a pardon from his continuing corruption trial, something people close to Netanyahu hoped he could also boost on the campaign trail. Now this seems unlikely.

“I wonder if Bibi wants to continue,” Trump told ABC News earlier this month, prompting the Israeli leader to say he was still running in the upcoming elections.

The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office did not respond to a request for comment. Asked for comment, a White House official said Trump has a very good partnership with Netanyahu and Israel, but added: “No country or leader puts pressure on President Trump to do anything.”

The two men were never best friends or golfing buddies. In an interview with the Journal in late 2025, Trump said that the relationship was in some ways symbiotic. “Bibi is a tough person, but so am I,” he said.

In part, longtime Netanyahu observers say he is not known for developing deep friendships because he trusts very few people around him. “He’s a very suspicious person,” Sachs said.

In addition to frequent calls, Netanyahu has met Trump at least seven times this term and has sought to publicly show that his relationship with Trump is strong.

People working for Netanyahu were asked to focus messages and social-media posts on the close relationship between the two men, a person familiar with the matter said. In a post in 2025, the two leaders were shown flying a B-2 bomber together. An AI-animated photo of Israel’s president was revealed so that only Netanyahu and Trump appear together. Top Israeli officials worked with anyone in Trump’s orbit who would talk to them, and the country even hired a social media influence firm run by Trump’s former campaign manager Brad Parscale. Parscale did not respond to requests for comment.

Throughout 2025, Netanyahu repeatedly met with Trump and urged him to attack Iran. At one point, Trump pulled the leader aside and took him on a private tour of the Lincoln Bedroom in the White House residence, officials said. Netanyahu calls him Donald, an informality that most world leaders do not approve of.

At another point, he brought a gold pager to Trump at the White House, which stunned the president, officials said. The Israelis then introduced pagers made of other materials for senior administration officials. It was a replica of the pagers that the Israelis had used to blow up members of the US-designated terrorist group Hezbollah.

“That night he called me and said, ‘Dude.’ I said, ‘Yeah, isn’t that something?’ He was surprised by it, and I think it gave him a new respect for Israel,” Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican and ally of the president, said in a March interview.

People familiar with the situation said Trump showed a greater willingness to go to war with Iran than many of his advisers, and more than the Israelis suspected. Netanyahu developed detailed plans to attack Iran and presented them to the President. “Bibi was reassuring Trump that we have a lot of potential,” Graham said.

Military cooperation between the two countries reached an unprecedented new level. According to military officials, the Israeli general was sitting in the American operations room. Dozens of American tankers were parked at Israel’s main civilian airport and other sites in Israel. Israeli pilots have learned to recognize the sounds of their American counterparts refueling in the air, the pilots said.

Still, Trump was hardly convinced of the need to send ground troops to Iran. He believed that America could dominate the regime with air power. Trump assessed that Tehran would have no choice but to dismantle its nuclear program under heavy bombardment, allaying concerns that Iran could close the strait or retaliate in a significant way.

Early on, Trump discussed with Netanyahu the accuracy of strikes on his targets, how many Iranian leaders were taken out and where he should drop the next bomb, people familiar with the matter said, even discussing specific sites in a late-night call. US officials said Trump showed more interest in the details of the war than his team expected and some of the enthusiasm came from Netanyahu’s update.

As the war began, Trump became skeptical of some of Netanyahu’s claims and rejected his plan Kurdish attack on Iran To overthrow the regime, Israeli officials said.

Netanyahu continues to oppose a deal with Iran over its nuclear program and insists that the regime will pursue a secret bomb race. However, Trump told Israeli leaders and his advisers that he wanted to solve the problem diplomatically, not through force alone. He told Netanyahu any deal would be “firm,” a person familiar with the call said.

In the interview, Trump said that Netanyahu has different goals in some aspects because his country is very close to Iran.

Now, after the call, Trump often asks others in his administration whether Netanyahu is right, something he had not done regularly in the past, a senior administration official said.

The thing that has disappointed Trump the most is Israel The bombing of Lebanon continues Administration officials said that despite the ceasefire. At one point, Trump brought Israeli and Lebanese officials into the Oval Office and tried to make a deal himself, according to attendees. The first clash occurred when Trump told others that he was shown pictures of Christians being bombed there.

In another call this month about Lebanon, details of which were first reported by Axios, he called netanyahu “I’m crazy” and told him he would remain in jail without his support.

Write to Josh Dawsey here joshua.docsey@WSJ.comin alexander ward alex.ward@wsj.com And on Anat Peled anat.peled@wsj.com