Trump, Netanyahu, and Iran

Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu left Washington without having an assurance from President Trump that the 17% tariff the President placed on Israeli goods would be removed, even though Israel, the day before, had removed all tariffs on American goods. Lowering that tariff will now be the subject of negotiation. But when it came to Gaza, there was no disagreement, no hint of any American dismay with the way the IDF was conducting the war. That was a great relief for the Israelis, who remember the pressures Israel experience during the Biden administration, which tried to direct the IDF’s conduct of its war.

The third item discussed between Trump and Netanyahu was Iran. The Islamic Republic has been racing forward, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, to enrich large quantities of uranium up to 60% purity, which is just one step below weapons-grade. Iran is believed by the International Atomic Energy Agency’s director, Rafael Grossi, to be close to having enough enriched uranium to make six nuclear bombs. While the Iranians keep reassuring the world that they have no intention of making nuclear weapons, the only possible explanation for their enriching uranium to such a level is to use that uranium not in nuclear energy plants, but in weapons. Nuclear energy plants built for civilian use do not require that level of enrichment.

Trump surprised Netanyahu, who kept a poker face but must have been disturbed by the news, by waiting until he arrived in Washington to tell him about his, Trump’s, intention to enter negotiations with the Iranians about their nuclear program. In fact, it was Steve Witkoff who broke the news to Netanyahu when he first settled in at Blair House. The Israelis were not expecting the US to agree to negotiate with Iran; they had expected that Trump would again state that “Iran will never acquire nuclear weapons, no matter what it takes to stop them.” Instead, here was Trump surprising the Israelis with news of American negotiations with Tehran.

More on this development can be found here: “Some Israelis Favor Attacking Iran, Expressing Skepticism About Talks,” by Isabel Kershner, New York Times, April 8, 2025:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has in the past listed the three main threats facing Israel as “Iran, Iran and Iran.” He has largely staked his career on being Israel’s protector against Iranian nuclear ambitions, has openly confronted Tehran in recent months and is at war with Iran-backed militias around the region.

Many Israelis were therefore surprised when President Trump, with Mr. Netanyahu sitting beside him, announced on Monday that the United States would engage in “direct” negotiations with Iran on Saturday in a last-ditch effort to rein in the country’s nuclear program….

By early evening in Israel, Mr. Netanyahu had issued a video statement before his departure from Washington in which he largely strove to emphasize his close alliance and alignment with the Trump administration.

“We agree that Iran will not have nuclear weapons,” he said, adding that this could be achieved by diplomatic accord. But a negotiated solution, he explained, would have to result in the total destruction of Iran’s vast nuclear program, blowing up facilities and dismantling all equipment, all carried out by the United States.

But should Iran drag out the talks, Mr. Netanyahu said, the second option would be a military one. “Everyone understands that,” he said, adding, “We discussed it at length.”…

Trump has made clear that he will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons, repeating that “it’s not going to happen.” But he has said nothing publicly about carrots he might offer to entice Iran to give up its nuclear program, nor has he said that he would not hesitate to use military force if necessary to end Iran’s nuclear program. His silence on this matter worries the Israelis, who want the US to issue a clear threat.

Optimists can point to the fact that the US has just delivered to Israel several THAAD anti-missile systems, the most advanced in the American armory, presumably to intercept Iranian long-range missiles. Furthermore, in another sign of Washington’s preparation for a possible war with Iran, the US now has two naval battle groups in the region, and has pre-positioned 6 B-2 bombers at its airbase on Diego Garcia Island, part of the Chagos Islands, that are capable of carrying the 30,000 pound bunker-buster bombs, or MOPs (Massive Ordnance Penetrators), that would be able to destroy the underground nuclear facility at Natanz and the nuclear facility built inside a mountain at Fordow. The Iranians must surely be thinking that those B-2 bombers can have only one purpose, and that they have been brought to the Middle East to make clear to Iran that the military threat from the Americans is real.

But what if the threat to Iran has no effect? What if the Iranians are merely stalling for time, as they continue to speed up their efforts to manufacture nuclear weapons and the ballistic missiles to deliver them on their warheads? At what point will the Trump administration be willing to break off the negotiations with Iran as fruitless, and instead use those bombers and drop those bunker-buster bombs to destroy the nuclear program that Tehran, it will become clear, never had any intention of giving up?

Iran’s rulers will never willingly give up the nuclear program that their scientists have been working on for decades, and on which they have spent tens of billions of dollars. To allow all of that to be destroyed, and by America, the Great Satan, possibly in collaboration with Israel, the Little Satan, would be too humiliating for the Supreme Leader. It might, in fact, be so humiliating that his rule could be threatened. He and his associates will keep talking to the Americans, hoping to stave off any attack until they have managed to both manufacture a half-dozen nuclear weapons and the ballistic missiles to deliver them. But Trump does not like to be crossed, or tricked, or to be hornswoggled by anyone, but especially by the Iranians.

And what about Trump’s visceral opposition to sending troops to fight a long and colossally wasteful war, like those he witnessed in Iraq and Afghanistan? But there would be no such long war with Iran. The bombers would complete their work not in years or months, but over a few days, hitting every nuclear facility in the country — Mossad has a complete target list ready — and the Iranians, whose defenses were leveled by the Israeli Air Force on October 26, 2024, have no way to stop them.