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Donald Trump used a White House dinner for Benjamin Netanyahu to toast the “tremendous success” of their relationship despite the lack of tangible progress on permanent peace deals with Iran and Hamas.
The Israeli prime minister praised Trump for “forging peace, as we speak, in one country, in one region after the other”. Netanyahu reached across the table in the Blue Room to hand Trump a letter he wrote to the Nobel Peace Prize committee proposing the US president for the award — an accolade the president covets.
“It’s nominating you for the Peace Prize, which is well deserved, and you should get it”, Netanyahu told Trump. “It’s a great honour,” Trump replied.
The reunion of the two leaders after their aerial campaigns against Tehran papered over some of the tensions between Trump and Netanyahu that flared in the run-up and aftermath of the Iran strikes.
Most crucially, Trump and Netanyahu did not reach any big breakthroughs on the questions surrounding the future of the Middle East, from the near-term prospects for a ceasefire in Gaza, postwar plans for the enclave, and negotiations for a longer-term pact with Iran.
Trump has been pushing Netanyahu with increasing urgency for a truce in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, which he hoped to clinch “this week”. When asked about a possible deal, the US president said the negotiations were going well. “I don’t think there’s a hold-up,” he said.
He then quickly turned back to discussing Iran and its limited retaliation against the US strikes. “In the end, missiles were shot and every single missile was shot out of the air,” Trump said.
Hamas said on Friday that it had delivered a “positive” response to a 60-day ceasefire involving the release of Israeli hostages and the beginning of talks on a permanent end to the conflict.
Netanyahu on Sunday dispatched negotiators to Doha to try to finalise the US-brokered deal. Trump is sending Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff to join the talks.
Meanwhile, Trump and Netanyahu both said the US and Israel were close to finding other countries to resettle Palestinians displaced from Gaza. “I think we’re getting close to finding several countries,” Netanyahu said.
“We’ve had great co-operation from countries surrounding Israel,” Trump added.
But when asked whether there could be a “two-state solution” with Palestine as an independent country alongside Israel, Trump departed from traditional US support for this position. “I don’t know,” he said, punting the question to Netanyahu.
“I think Palestinians should have all the powers the government has but none of the power should threaten us,” Netanyahu said.
The future of Tehran’s nuclear programme also remained unresolved. “We have scheduled Iran talks,” Trump told reporters. Witkoff said there would be a meeting “in the next week or so”.
The US president added that he would be keen to give Iran sanctions relief so it can start reassembling its economy. “They are very biting sanctions. And I would love to be able to, at the right time, to take those sanctions off, give them a chance at rebuilding,” Trump said.
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