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President Donald Trump issued Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a stern warning Oct. 4, according to a new report.
At that point, representatives from the Trump administration had hashed out an agreement with other mediators from countries including Qatar, Egypt and Turkey — just days before the two-year anniversary of the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.
Trump didn’t mince his words during a call with Netanyahu: the deal would be announced and Netanyahu had no other choice but to get on board, Time magazine reported Thursday.
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“Bibi, you can’t fight the world,” Trump said he told Netanyahu, as he detailed their conversation in an interview with Time. “You can fight individual battles, but the world’s against you.”
Although Netanyahu resisted, Trump’s patience had expired. Trump “launched into a profanity-laced monologue cataloging all he’d done for Israel as President: moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing its sovereignty over the Golan Heights, brokering the Abraham Accords that normalized relations between Israel and several Arab states, even joining Israel’s strikes on Iran in June,” according to Time.
As a result, Trump indicated that he would no longer back Netanyahu if the prime minister didn’t agree to the peace deal, Time reported.
“It was a very blunt and straightforward statement to Bibi…that he has no tolerance for anything other than this,” Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, told the outlet.
Netanyahu ultimately agreed to the deal, which includes a provision requiring Israeli forces to pull its troops, and a complete disarmament of Hamas.
The deal also required Hamas to return the hostages that were still in captivity within 72 hours of signing the agreement. Hamas has yet to turn over some of the remains of deceased Israeli hostages.
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Netanyahu’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.
Israel began to face increased pressure and frustration from the Trump administration after it conducted strikes against Hamas leaders in Doha, Qatar, in September. Qatar is a U.S. ally, and the attack violated the country’s sovereignty — prompting Trump to say at the time that he was “very unhappy about every aspect” of the situation.
But Trump used the attack as leverage to convince regional leaders to band together and negotiate an end to the conflict.
“This was one of the things that brought us all together,” Trump told Time. “It was so out of joint that it sort of got everybody to do what they have to do. If you took that away, we might not be talking about this subject right now.”
Trump has hailed the peace agreement as a victory, and visited with Israeli lawmakers in the Knesset and other officials in Egypt to recognize the finalization of the first phase of the deal.
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“At long last, we have peace in the Middle East, and it’s a very simple expression, peace in the Middle East,” Trump told reporters in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
“We’ve heard it for many years, but nobody thought it could ever get there,” Trump said. “And now we’re there.”
Now, Trump has indicated that he is setting his sights on ending the war between Russia and Ukraine, and signaled his administration will build off the momentum from the Middle East peace agreement to end the conflict in Europe.
Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy Friday, and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte Wednesday, to discuss the conflict.
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