Amid all the White House commotion, the world barely seemed to notice last week when President Donald Trump threatened an American and Israeli military action against Iran if it doesn’t agree to scrap its nuclear weapons program.
Trump, who ran on a promise to stop wars around the world, surely doesn’t want another Middle East conflict. But he’s being pressured by Israel, which sees Tehran at a period of maximum vulnerability after the defeat of its allies in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria — and the devastating Israeli attack on its air defenses and missile production sites in October.
Israel wants to seize the moment, American and Israeli officials told me. If Iran won’t agree to a Libya-style abandonment of its nuclear facilities, Israel is prepared to bomb those facilities — with or without U.S. support, the officials said. The Biden administration had weighed in its final days whether to support this Israeli ultimatum but decided against it, officials said. Now it’s at the top of Trump’s inbox.
Trump was blunt about the Iran showdown in his recent interview with Bret Baier of Fox News. “Everyone thinks Israel, with our help or our approval, will go in and bomb the hell out of them. I would prefer that not happen. I’d much rather see a deal with Iran where we can do a deal — supervise, check it, inspect it and then blow it up or just make sure that there is no more nuclear” facilities.
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Trump summed up the gunpoint-diplomacy this way: “There’s two ways of stopping them: with bombs or with a written piece of paper. And I’d much rather do a deal.”
Trump hopes weakness will compel Tehran to bargain. “I think Iran is very nervous. I think they are scared. I think Iran would love to make a deal, and I would love to make a deal with them without bombing them,” he told Baier. He noted that after Israel’s October attack on Iran, “their [air] defense is largely gone.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has discussed with Trump several possible levels of American backing, ranging from active military support for a kinetic strike — such as intelligence, refueling or other assistance — to more limited political backing for a coercive ultimatum. The United States has already provided Israel with bunker-busting munitions that could severely damage Iranian centrifuges and other uranium-enrichment equipment buried in a mountain fortress in Fordow, near Qom.
U.S. military intelligence analysts concluded in a January assessment that Israel would probably strike Iran’s nuclear facilities in the first six months of 2025, absent an agreement, The Post reported Wednesday. The article quoted National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes describing Trump’s position: “While he prefers negotiating a resolution … peacefully, he will not wait indefinitely if Iran isn’t willing to deal, and soon.”
The Biden and Trump administrations have both debated how long an Israeli strike would delay Iran’s nuclear program. One U.S. official told me it would be a six-month setback, at best. But Israeli officials think the effects would last a year or more. One reason for Israel’s urgency is that officials fear Iran is secretly racing toward the 90 percent enrichment level needed for bombs.
Trump, ever the dealmaker, has envisioned an epic bargain with Iran since his first term. Though in 2018 he scrapped the nuclear deal that President Barack Obama had negotiated, he claimed he could get a better, bigger deal. He worked with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and French President Emmanuel Macron to coax Iran — under sanctions pressure — to agree. Mark T. Esper, then defense secretary, said in August 2019, “We want to talk with Iran and talk about a diplomatic path forward.” But that effort failed.
Trump’s sledgehammer approach to negotiations — disrupt and then deal — has been the central feature of these first weeks of his second term. But threatening kinetic action against Iran is a reach, even for Trump. He clearly doesn’t want a war. But the final decision-maker here may be Netanyahu, not Trump.