It’s been a couple of months since I wrote anything about the Iran war, mostly because the topic is so much a moving target. Not just in the sense that all wars are opaque and unpredictable (even in this case to the extent of whether “war” is the appropriate term on any particular day), but more specifically in that Donald Trump’s projects are inherently resistant to rational forecasting.
I’ve made this point before of course, criticising those who look for method in Trump’s madness and quoting AJP Taylor’s remark that “Fascism is the irrational made vocal, and therefore any attempt to reduce it to rational terms defeats itself.” But Trump also has a degree of raw cunning, and can sometimes be very perceptive about the motives and actions of those he deals with – as seen this week in his shouting match with Benjamin Netanyahu.
You’ve probably seen the reports by now. Trump, desperate for a deal that would end his misconceived Iranian adventure, blamed (rightly) Netanyahu for sabotaging his efforts. Apparently he said something along the lines of “You’re f*cking 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 later described this as “a very productive call.”
Trump is not the first president to have expressed frustration with the Israeli leader. Barack Obama once told Nicolas Sarkozy “You’re sick of him? I have to work with him every day.” Last year, before the war started, Trump was already complaining “I don’t know why you’re always so f*cking negative,” and his mood has evidently not been improved by three months of intermittent and unsatisfactory warfare.
But for Netanyahu, facing a critical election later in the year, it’s embarrassing to have Trump see through him so comprehensively and so publicly. Israel’s voters know how much their country depends on American goodwill: an American leader who warns that their prime minister is making life harder for them is likely to be listened to, however rarely he might otherwise make sense.
And the question goes deeper than the particular point that Trump was making. Equally important is the fact that the conversation was made public so quickly and in such detail. Evidently someone quite high in the administration, if not Trump himself, was happy to see it in the papers: whether for its effect on the Iranians, or the Israelis, or the American public, or perhaps all three.
Nor should one assume that turning against Netanyahu is necessarily a sign of greater sanity within the administration, tempting as that might be. As I explained back in April, both pro- and anti-Israel wings have their competing pathologies, and the ascendancy of the latter may simply mean the triumph of “the party’s nativists, Putinists and antisemites.” It will also mean that the people of Iran will once again be left in the lurch, although it’s not obvious that the Israeli project of reimposing the Pahlavi dynasty on them would have been much improvement.
But for Trump, who also faces an important election in the shape of November’s midterms, the priority is to end the war, get energy prices back down and save at least a minimal amount of face. Even at the start the war was not popular in America and by now it is clearly a drag on his popularity – although there are a number of other things in that category as well. The Republicans in Congress are also getting restless, worried about their seats and perhaps about future retribution for the crimes they’ve been complicit in.
One way or another, the war looks like coming to an end soon. Netanyahu won’t like it, but he’s not going to have a lot of choice.
The World is Not Enough 