US President Donald Trump made a series of key foreign policy statements, outlining the future of US military operations in the Middle East and relations with Washington's key allies. In an interview with the famous radio host Hugh Hewitt, broadcast at a time of renewed hostilities, the American leader categorically denied rumors that he had stopped supporting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu due to tactical differences. Trump stressed that the two get along very well, although he sometimes openly disagrees with him, defining Netanyahu as a “wartime prime minister who is doing a good job“. According to him, without his own administration or that of Netanyahu, Israel would not exist today because of Tehran's aggressive actions.
In parallel, Trump made unprecedentedly harsh warnings to Iran, revealing that the US military has the exact locations of Iranian government officials and is fully prepared to physically eliminate them. Although he refused to go into operational details, the president made it clear that US intelligence is closely monitoring the surviving Iranian leadership after the massive air strikes. Trump confirmed the resumption of heavy strikes on Iranian infrastructure and announced that the Pentagon is planning new attacks, and “there is no force that can stop them“.
The head of state also commented on the diplomatic collapse between the two countries, calling the previously signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) simply “a test that Iran failed“. Trump criticized the traditional American diplomatic practice of first moving through memoranda and only then to real agreements. He pointed out that he had insisted on a direct and hard deal, but the failed memorandum served as a test of Tehran's will - a test that Iranian leaders have trampled by renewed attacks in the Strait of Hormuz and failure to fulfill commitments.