US vice-president tells Benjamin Netanyahu to ‘wake up’ and stop criticising Trump’s Iran peace deal
NEW DELHI — The US vice-president JD Vance has warned Israel that America is the only friend it has left and it cannot kill its way out of problem. He also criticised senior Israeli ministers for opposing Washington’s agreement with Iran.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir have voiced opposition to the memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed a day earlier by US President Donald Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.
Addressing a press conference on Thursday, Vance warned Israel not to alienate its only remaining ‘powerful ally’ in the US, pointing out the billions of dollars in military assistance Washington provides to the country each year.
“The problem for Israel is not Donald J. Trump,” Vance said. “And anybody in Israel who thinks their biggest problem is the president of the United States needs to wake up and smell the reality of the situation that country is in.”
Vance was defending the MoU reached this week between Washington and Tehran to end the war in West Asia, an agreement that has drawn criticism from Israeli conservatives and Israeli ministers.
He called on Israel to let negotiations play out, and to “give a little bit of credit to the United States of America, which I think has been an incredible partner for the Israeli government for a long time”.
His statement was the latest instance of the Trump administration taking an atypically harsh approach – at least rhetorically – towards Israel, whose ongoing occupation of and military operations in southern Lebanon have repeatedly threatened to derail a more lasting agreement to end the war with Iran.
In recent days, Trump has criticised Israel’s rules of engagement, which war monitors have long said lead to high civilian casualties, while calling for restraint in its war with Hezbollah.
Responding to criticism of the deal by Israeli ministers, Vance said, ““And I guess my response to them would be: What is your exact proposal? You’re a country of nine million people. You can’t just kill your way out of solving every single national security problem that you have.”
He called on Israel to let negotiations play out, and to “give a little bit of credit to the United States of America, which I think has been an incredible partner for the Israeli government for a long time”.
His statement was the latest instance of the Trump administration taking an atypically harsh approach – at least rhetorically – towards Israel, whose ongoing occupation of and military operations in southern Lebanon have repeatedly threatened to derail a more lasting agreement to end the war with Iran.
In recent days, Trump has criticised Israel’s rules of engagement, which war monitors have long said lead to high civilian casualties, while calling for restraint in its war with Hezbollah.
“Too many people have been killed,” Trump said from the G7 Summit in France.
“You don’t have to knock down an apartment house every time you’re looking for somebody, because there are a lot of people in those apartment houses, and they’re not all Hezbollah,” he said.
Speaking at a subsequent news conference on Thursday, Vance continued the administration’s defence of the MoU with Iran, which opens the Strait of Hormuz, lifts the US naval blockade of Iranian ports and pledges to end fighting on all fronts, including in Lebanon. — Agencies
