Trump presses Israel over Lebanon as Iran deal advances
At the G7 summit in France, Trump warned Iran against pursuing a nuclear weapon and criticized Israel’s attacks in Lebanon.
By Daniel Okafor · Business Editor
3 min read
US President Donald Trump criticized Israel’s military campaign in Lebanon while promoting a tentative nuclear deal with Iran, comments that put fresh pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as regional tensions threaten the agreement. Speaking on Tuesday at the G7 summit in Evian-les-Bains, France, Trump said Iran would face severe consequences if it tried to obtain a nuclear weapon, according to Al Jazeera.
Trump made the remarks before a meeting with Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, on the sidelines of the summit. He said the ceasefire agreement with Iran was designed to prevent Tehran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, saying Iran “can’t have a nuclear weapon” or “they get blown up.”
Trump described the arrangement as a barrier to an Iranian bomb. “The only thing that really matters to me is Iran will never have a nuclear weapon,” he said, according to Al Jazeera.
The US-Iran memorandum of understanding is scheduled to be formally signed in Geneva on Friday, Al Jazeera reported. After that, Washington and Tehran will have 60 days to negotiate a final agreement.
Trump said he expected the next stage of talks to be easier than the first. He also said he believed Iran now had “rational leadership,” contrasting it with leaders he called “totally irrational” and saying they were “now gone” after US and Israeli strikes killed numerous Iranian officials early in the war, according to Al Jazeera.
Trump faults Israel over Lebanon strikes
Trump’s comments on Israel were unusually sharp. He said he had a strong relationship with Netanyahu but added that the Israeli prime minister “has to be more responsible with respect to Lebanon.”
Trump said Israel had been fighting Hezbollah for too long and that too many people were dying. He criticized attacks on residential buildings, saying Israel did not need to destroy an apartment building every time it was trying to target someone because many civilians lived in those buildings and “they’re not all Hezbollah.”
The remarks followed Trump’s criticism on Sunday of Israeli attacks on Beirut, which Al Jazeera reported had threatened to disrupt talks with Iran. Trump wrote on Truth Social that the strike “should not have happened,” especially when the sides were close to a peace deal with Iran.
Trump also said he had urged Israel to allow Syria to handle Hezbollah, saying he believed Syria would do a better job. Al Jazeera did not report further details on how that proposal would work.
Asked whether the US-Iran deal could hold if Israel carried out further attacks in Lebanon, Trump said it could. He described Iran as the central conflict and called the Hezbollah fight a smaller one, saying it repeatedly returned as a problem.
The remarks came as the G7 leaders met with Iran and Ukraine among the main issues on the agenda, according to Al Jazeera. Trump’s statements placed the Iran agreement at the center of his diplomacy while signaling frustration with Israeli actions that could complicate it.
This story draws on original reporting from Al Jazeera.