Former US President Donald Trump told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he wants the war in Gaza over before he takes office in January, assuming he wins next week’s presidential election, the Times of Israel reported on Wednesday.
Trump made the demand to Netanyahu when the pair met at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida in July, the Israeli news site reported, citing “a former Trump administration official and an Israeli official.”
Four months before the meeting, Trump told the Israel Hayom news outlet that “you have to finish up your war,” calling the destruction of civilian homes in Gaza “a very bad picture for the world.” Trump, who often touts his close relationship with Netanyahu and his support for Israel, said a week before the meeting that Israel should end the war “fast… because they are getting decimated with this [negative] publicity.”
In his public statements, Trump has never set a timeline for Netanyahu to cease military operations.
The officials who spoke to the Times of Israel stressed that Trump did not define what he would consider an end to the conflict, with the American source saying the Republican could very well support “residual” activity by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in Gaza.
Netanyahu has repeatedly stated that the IDF will continue to wage war until it achieves “total victory” over Hamas, and that Israel will maintain “full security control” over the strip afterwards.
Speaking to lawmakers from his Likud party earlier this week, Netanyahu said that he “can’t agree” to Hamas’ demand that the IDF withdraw from Gaza in exchange for the release of the roughly 100 hostages still held by the Palestinian militants.
Any pre-inauguration day victory, the American official said, must include the release of these hostages.
Further complicating matters is the fact that Netanyahu’s hardline coalition partners have signaled multiple times since last October that they would withdraw from government – tanking Netanyahu’s political career – at the first sign of any ceasefire with Hamas.
“There are internal political constraints to ending the war quickly,” an Israeli security official told the Times of Israel earlier this month, apparently referring to this possibility.
Despite his pro-Israel stance, Trump has made inroads with Arab-American voters by promising to end the fighting in Gaza and Lebanon. In a social media post on Wednesday aimed at Lebanese-Americans, Trump declared that the conflict in their homeland was “caused by Kamala Harris and Joe Biden,” and said that he would ensure “your friends and family in Lebanon… live in peace, prosperity, and harmony with their neighbors.”