This time, Trump and Netanyahu have really fallen out (followup to How to lose a war in three easy steps)

[usonian]

https://archive.is/20260618021444/https://www.ft.com/content/e14a6abe-f6fa-43d0-bbef-22139953e7b9#selection-1443.0-1443.53

Followup to:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100221317865
How to lose a war in three easy steps.

Put yourself in Donald Trump’s shoes. It was his 80th birthday and he was planning to cap White House festivities with his US-Iran deal. The agreement nearly unravelled, however, when Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a Sunday evening strike on Beirut. A flurry of White House calls averted Iranian retaliation. Assurances were given via mediators and the deal was saved. Trump’s late Rome-flavoured cage fight could go ahead.

But Trump was still in a foul mood. “Why did Bibi have to do a fucking attack?” he told Axios. “I was so pissed off. I let him know. He has no fucking judgment. I let him know that.” The answer to Trump’s question is that his Iran deal is likely to be a political death sentence for Netanyahu. He thus has every incentive to reignite Gulf war III. He has bet his own and Israel’s future on getting Trump to bring about regime change in Iran. That bet has exploded in his face.

snip

Netanyahu sold Trump and his own public on the idea that, after 47 years, Iran’s theocrats were finally meeting their Waterloo. All Operation Epic Fury required was some lethal targeting and the Iranian people would do the rest.

Rarely has a geopolitical roll of the dice gone so rapidly wrong. Netanyahu played on Trump’s vanity to help convince him to start this war. That same vanity will now be deaf to any future bridges Netanyahu might try to sell.

In's and out's at the link.