Trump and His Word

When it comes to Iran, the meeting between Netanyahu and Trump could prove fateful

By Michael Oren

In my media interviews, I am always being asked what Trump is thinking and what he is going to do about Iran. The questions are more pressing today, as Prime Minister Netanyahu holds his seventh meeting with President Trump in the United States. And each time I am asked “what is Trump thinking,” I have to answer with the three hardest words every analyst can utter, “I don’t know.” But what I do know is this:

Even as Trump’s representatives, Steven Witkoff and Jared Kushner, negotiate with the Iranians, the United States continues to build up massive military forces in the Middle East. On a single day last week, 117 large military transports landed in the area carrying hundreds of tons of weapons, ammunition, and anti-missile systems. Another aircraft carrier, the USS H.W. Bush, will soon join the USS Lincoln in the Persian Gulf. Together with other U.S. naval and air forces, they will threaten Iran with hundreds of jet fighters, strategic bombers, and sea-to-land missiles.

Immense assets will be needed not only to destroy Iranian bases and command centers but to protect U.S. ships from the thousands of rockets, drones, and suicide speedboats that the Iranians will surely unleash in retaliation for any American attack. With many in his own MAGA movement already criticizing his involvement in Ukraine, Venezuela, and Gaza as a betrayal of his promises to put “America first,” Trump cannot risk an even bigger involvement in Iran that costs American lives. So why, then, would Trump take the risk of attacking Iran? Why not cut a deal that freezes, rather than dismantles, Iran’s nuclear program, and declare it better than the deal that Obama signed in 2015?

The answer stems from the one thing I know most of all. More than his support for Israel, more than his empathy for the Iranian people, Donald Trump needs to stand by his word. He publicly vowed to rescue the Iranians from their evil government and to overthrow it. Failure to do so could result in the president being labeled as a leader who draws a red line but recoils from enforcing it.

The meeting between Netanyahu and Trump, consequently, could prove fateful. The prime minister needs to clarify Trump’s goals in the negotiations and to learn, to the greatest degree possible, if, when, and how the U.S. will attack. He must seek assurances regarding Israel’s participation in any military operation. And if the administration’s talks with the Iranians conclude without eliminating or limiting Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities—a potentially existential danger for Israel—Netanyahu must seek American backing for unilateral Israeli action to destroy it.