The United States (US) President, Donald Trump, has called the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “crazy” in an expletive-filled phone exchange over fighting in Lebanon.
This was confirmed by the controversial president in an interview broadcast on Wednesday. Trump was asked whether he had called the longtime Israeli leader “effing crazy” and accused him of ingratitude while the U.S. was trying to negotiate an end to hostilities with Iran, paraphrasing a report by Axios.
“I did,” Trump told the “Pod Force One” podcast. “I wouldn’t say angry. I was a little bit perturbed at his constantly fighting with Lebanon, you know.”
Trump went on to say he and Netanyahu get along very well.
According to the Axios report, which cited an unidentified U.S. official, Trump said to Netanyahu in a call on Monday: “You’re fucking crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this.”
Trump said in the interview: “At some point I said, Bibi, we got to stop this. We got to stop it.”
Israeli officials have not commented publicly on the phone conversation since the Axios report, but Israeli media have quoted sources playing down the friction between the two leaders. Netanyahu’s office declined to comment on Trump’s confirmation of the comments.
Iran has said it will not agree to a deal with the United States to end the war that Trump and Netanyahu launched in late February, unless a ceasefire also covers Lebanon, which Israel invaded in March in pursuit of the Iran-aligned Hezbollah militia that fired across the border in support of Tehran.
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