Trump says he is \u201cvery unhappy about every aspect\u201d of Israeli operation
\n WASHINGTON
\nLess than four months ago, President Donald Trump met with the leader of Qatar, praising his opulent palace and signing a sweeping defence agreement with the Gulf monarchy, a key ally that hosts the biggest US base in the Middle East.
\nIsrael\u2019s surprise attack on Tuesday against Hamas leaders in Doha has jolted that relationship, angering Trump and drawing fierce condemnation from Doha and Western allies.
\nOrdered by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and targeting the political offices of the Palestinian group, the strikes killed a Qatari security agent and five others, but failed to kill the Hamas leaders. Trump said he was \u201cvery unhappy about every aspect\u201d of the Israeli operation.
\nBut for all the indignation, the strikes are unlikely to change the president\u2019s fundamental approach toward Israel, analysts and US officials say. If anything, the bombings underlined the cold calculus beneath the Trump-Netanyahu relationship.
\nIsrael has shown it is not afraid to act against US interests. The administration of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not formally warn Washington of its impending bombing campaign on Tuesday, US officials said.
\nThat lack of warning recalled Israel\u2019s September 2024 attack on Hezbollah, when Israel wounded thousands of the group\u2019s members with booby-trapped pagers, without informing then-President Joe Biden.
\nTrump, for his part, has occasionally expressed displeasure with Netanyahu. But his administration has strongly supported Israel\u2019s campaign to weaken Hamas and allowed it to largely take the lead on key issues such as Iran\u2019s nuclear program.
\n\u201cOn this one, I think Trump is annoyed by Netanyahu\u2019s tactics,\u201d said Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and veteran US peace negotiator.
\nBut, Miller added, \u201c(Trump\u2019s) instinct is that he agrees with Netanyahu\u2019s notion that Hamas cannot just be hollowed out as a military organisation. It needs to be fundamentally weakened.\u201d
\nAsked for comment, the White House referred Reuters to remarks by Trump on Truth Social on Tuesday night, during which he said the bombings did not advance US or Israeli interests.
\n\u201cHowever,\u201d Trump wrote, \u201celiminating Hamas, who have profited off the misery of those living in Gaza, is a worthy goal.\u201d
\nThe Israeli Embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.
\nNo rupture likely
\nSome analysts declined to rule out the possibility that Netanyahu may yet exhaust Trump\u2019s patience if he springs more surprises on Washington.
\nIn practice, that could mean a withdrawal of political cover for Israel\u2019s ongoing invasion of Gaza, which has provoked outrage among European and Arab nations as famine conditions spread.
\nIsrael\u2019s military campaign in the Palestinian enclave was triggered by a Hamas-led rampage in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
\n\u201cAs his Arab friends complain to him about what Israel is doing \u2014 and they are doing so now \u2014 he may say to them give me a credible plan for the day after in Gaza and with an alternative to Hamas running it and I will tell Bibi you have done enough,\u201d said Dennis Ross, a former Middle East negotiator for Democratic and Republican administrations.
\nIsrael\u2019s strike in Doha will likely dampen Trump\u2019s hopes for more Gulf states joining the Abraham Accords, a landmark agreement brokered by his first administration in which several Arab countries forged diplomatic ties with Israel.
\nStill, a rupture between the two men seems unlikely, argued Michael Oren, Israel\u2019s former ambassador to the United States, saying that Trump appreciates strength and transactions that end wars.
\n\u201cIf Netanyahu can continue to appeal to those two sides of this president then he will be okay. I\u2019m not concerned about the relationship,\u201d said Oren.
\nHot and cold
\nThe Trump-Netanyahu partnership has seen ups and downs, administration officials acknowledge.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s been hot and cold since the campaign,\u201d said one senior White House official.
\nIn May, Trump travelled to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates during his first major foreign trip, skipping Israel, which many analysts viewed as a snub. The Republican president returned to office in January promising to reinvigorate relations with Netanyahu that had deteriorated under his Democratic predecessor.
\nDuring that trip, Trump agreed to lift sanctions on the new Syrian government at the behest of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. That move alarmed Israeli officials who question the motives of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, a former al-Qaeda commander.
\nBut just a month later, the Trump-Netanyahu alliance seemed back on track. After Israel launched an air war on Iran in June, Trump \u2014 who campaigned on ending foreign conflicts \u2014 surprised even some of his own political allies by sending B-2 bombers to partially destroy Iran\u2019s key nuclear facilities.
\nIf that created goodwill within the Netanyahu administration, it did not benefit Trump\u2019s foreign policy interests, at least in the short term.
\nDays later, Trump profanely chastised Iran and Israel for breaking a US-brokered ceasefire. In July, the US appeared to criticise an Israeli strike in Damascus, which destroyed part of Syria\u2019s defence ministry. And on Tuesday, Israel notified the US shortly before the Qatar strike, but there was no coordination with or approval from Washington, two US officials said.
\n\u201cThe US can seek to cajole and push Israel to take decisions,\u201d said Jonathan Panikoff, a former deputy US national intelligence officer on the Middle East. \u201cBut Netanyahu will continue to act in a manner that it views as in the best interests of Israel alone.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Trump says he is \u201cvery unhappy about every aspect\u201d of Israeli operation WASHINGTON Less than four months ago, President Donald Trump met with the leader of Qatar, praising his opulent palace and signing a sweeping defence agreement with the Gulf monarchy, a key ally that hosts the biggest US base in the Middle East. Israel\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502341,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-502323","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n