Trump Doesn’t Care If Iran Talks Are Over and Calls Netanyahu ‘Fucking Crazy’
He's getting tired of all the winning.
CNBC (“Trump tells CNBC: ‘I don’t care’ if Iran negotiations are over“):
President Donald Trump on Monday shrugged off the possible collapse of peace negotiations with Iran, telling CNBC, “I don’t care if they’re over, honestly.”
“I really don’t care. I couldn’t care less,” Trump told CNBC’s Eamon Javers in a phone interview midday Monday, saying he thought the protracted discussions “started to get very boring.”
Trump had been asked about the prospect of Iran ending talks with the U.S. in light of reporting earlier Monday that Iranian negotiators would take that step — and also move to “completely block” the Strait of Hormuz — due to Israel’s military operations in Lebanon against the Iran-backed militia Hezbollah.
Asked if the Iranians told him that they are not going to negotiate further, Trump said, “No, they haven’t.”
Trump said he was “going to ask” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “what’s going on with Lebanon.”
Trump said in a Truth Social post Monday afternoon that he “had a very productive call” with Netanyahu. “There will be no Troops going to Beirut, and any Troops that are on their way, have already been turned back,” Trump wrote.
He said in the same post that he spoke with Hezbollah “through highly placed Representatives,” and “they agreed that all shooting will stop — That Israel will not attack them, and they will not attack Israel.”
In another post, Trump wrote, “Talks are continuing, at a rapid pace, with the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Netanyahu, in an X post later Monday, said he told Trump that “if Hezbollah does not cease attacking our cities and citizens—Israel will attack terror targets in Beirut.”
David Sanger, NYT (“High-Wire Negotiations With Iran? Trump Finds It ‘Very Boring.’“):
For three months, President Trump has been deeply engaged in the Iran conflict, planning the 38 days of attack, struggling to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and proclaiming “a whole civilization will die tonight,” then backing away to declare a cease-fire and a naval blockage of Iranian ports.
But on Monday, after days of haggling with Iranian officials through intermediaries on a preliminary agreement, Mr. Trump declared it was starting “to get very boring.”
“I don’t care if they’re over, honestly,” he told Eamon Javers of CNBC when asked about reports that the Iranians, angry at continued Israeli strikes in Lebanon and low-level conflict with the United States in the Persian Gulf, were threatening to stop negotiating. “I really don’t care. I couldn’t care less. If they’re over, they’re over.”
There are reasons to doubt that Mr. Trump is truly so unconcerned: Gasoline prices have soared since the war began, with a senior Exxon-Mobil official predicting recently that prices could go far higher, and Republicans are taking note of how deeply unpopular the war with Iran is with their constituents. In recent weeks he has professed indifference about a range of issues that carry deep political consequences for him, including the midterm elections and the financial situation that Americans are facing.
But even for Mr. Trump, who has veered from threatening the Iranians with annihilation to declaring that they had already agreed to American terms to fuming that they have not, it seemed strange that he thought the whole conflict was becoming a bore.
[…]
Back in March, Mr. Trump confidently predicted the conflict would be over in a few weeks, saying it was not possible to suffer from boredom while facing off against a longtime American adversary: “Somebody said today, they said, ‘oh, well, the president wants to do it really quickly. After that, he’ll get bored.’”
“There’s nothing boring about this,” he added.
Axios (“‘You’re fucking crazy’: Trump fumes at Netanyahu in call on Lebanon“):
President Trump lashed out at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over Israel’s escalation in Lebanon in an expletive-laden call on Monday, two U.S. officials and a third source briefed on the call told Axios.
[…]
One U.S. official said Trump told Netanyahu that following through on his threats to bomb the Lebanese capital would further isolate Israel around the world. Two of the sources said Trump claimed he’d helped keep Netanyahu out of jail — a reference to his support during Netanyahu’s corruption trial.
Summarizing Trump’s remarks to Netanyahu, the U.S. official said: “You’re fucking 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.”
A second source briefed on the call said Trump was “pissed” and at one point yelled at Netanyahu: “What the fuck are you doing?”
[…]
Trump and Netanyahu have had several tense calls in the past but have still coordinated closely on Iran and other issues. One official said this was one of Trump’s worst calls with Netanyahu since he returned to office. Trump’s anger appeared to be driven by the fact that Netanyahu’s decision to escalate in Lebanon was threatening to implode his negotiations with Iran. After the call, Trump posted on Truth Social that the Iran talks were “continuing, at a rapid pace.”
WaPo (“Iran says it is breaking off ceasefire talks over Israeli attacks on Lebanon“):
Escalating violence in the Middle East is threatening to derail stalled peace talks between Iran and the United States as negotiators struggle to extend a shaky ceasefire and end the war.
Iran suspended talks with the U.S. on Monday after Israel intensified attacks in Lebanon, according to state media reports and an Iranian official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the press.
[…]
Expanded Israeli military operations are complicating peace talks between Iran and the U.S. because Iranian officials insist that a cessation of hostilities in Lebanon was included under the ceasefire announced in April. Hezbollah was funded and trained by Iran over decades and remains a key ally.
“The ceasefire between Iran and the U.S. is unequivocally a ceasefire on all fronts including in Lebanon,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted Monday on X. “Violation on one front is a violation of the ceasefire on all fronts.”
U.S. and Iranian negotiators have been engaged in talks for weeks, but have failed to resolve key differences on the future of Iran’s nuclear program and control of the Strait of Hormuz. Now, the ceasefire is increasingly coming under strain, with the two sides trading tit-for-tat attacks in recent days.
[…]
In addition to Israeli operations in Lebanon, the official said last-minute changes to the deals’ terms by U.S. negotiators over the weekend also frustrated progress. The official said U.S. negotiators had not informed their Iranian counterparts of the new deal terms.
Tehran’s decision to pull back from the talks highlights the difficulty Trump is facing in bringing an end to an unpopular war that has caused worldwide economic disruption, including spiking energy prices.
U.S. military planners across several continents were on heightened alert for the potential expansion of hostilities, according to people familiar with the issue, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive security issues.
I’ve been a student of military science and international relations for a little over four decades now, and have never seen anything quite like this. I truly have no idea what the administration’s strategy is. I can only conclude that President Trump, who knows more than anybody about these things, is playing four-dimensional chess beyond my simple understanding. Quite possibly, he’s simply applying the madman theory at a level never before seen.
Add in a source that I receive daily: Iran Update from ISW.
As was the case during the pandemic, Trump (1) doesn’t know what he is talking about, and (2) can’t keep his mouth shut. It seems this guy spends 4 hours a day watching television and 3 hours a day on the phone with reporters – driving home points 1 and 2 above. I hate to beat a dead horse, but if this was Joe Biden being so erratic and ignorant there would be banner headlines at the NYT and WaPo, and lead stories on the nightly news about the need to get the president some professional help.
Who knew that politics in the Middle East could be so complicated? /s
Trump’s attention span is rather famously very, very short. He’s now officially “bored” with a war he started, especially because–SHOCKER!–there’s no easy way out.
Eventually this will come to an end, but what that looks like??? It won’t happen under the Felon, we can expect that the current talk some, bomb a bit will continue through the administration. After that, who knows?
Whatever the next administration is, the situation that they face will be different than what the Felon is facing. Countries are going to come to their own accomodation with Iran and likely capitulate to paying some sort of toll. The administration will bluster, but will they really enforce the blockade against shipping companies owned by Europeans, Chinese and Japanese? Some pipelines will be built to deliver oil to the Red Sea and possibly the Mediterranean via the Sinai.
Reportedly R Iran hawks intervened to keep the Felon from walking away from the Gulf last week, but I didn’t see any reports that they were asked how they’d proceed.
America and Israel lost the ability to stick to the terms of any negotiation. Treachery is now basically fundamental to the existence of Israel and Trump’s America. The idea that there’s a way to get Israel out of Lebanon is absurd: Israel is never leaving and can not stop murdering children and civilians: all they are now is a murdering machine backed up by torture and degradation. So I don’t believe for a second Axios’ recitation of another fake story about bad Netanyahu: Trump and Israel are frantically trying to sell something to somebody. They have no idea who, nobody does.
This is really the first conflict in my lifetime where America seems to have the lost the battle as well as the war. We almost always lose the war: that’s a given now. But the pointless battles and dipshit-named operations and the acceptable collateral damage was what America excelled at. It’s like having second thoughts and turning it into a career. No one did it better than us, and that’s how America was able to exit every disaster they created.
One question that has been gnawing at me over the past few days:
Why, oh why, does the press keep
trying to kick Lucy’s footballclaiming a deal with Iran is imminent?I’m stunned.
He got one thing right.
This deserves another FIFA peace prize medal.
Or maybe not. After all, it takes one to know one.
But Her Emails.
Truly a LAMF moment for Trump specifically and Republicans broadly, who openly encouraged Bibi to sabotage the Biden admin, and Obama-Hillary-Kerry diplomatic efforts before that. However dangerous, it’s delicious to see Netanyahu give Trump the Biden treatment. The pedo president’s tirade has been promptly ignored; Israel is still striking Lebanon today. (And so much for the Hamas Piker left’s childish insistence that Ben Gvir’s and Smotrich’s terrorism can be ended by a
strongly-worded letterphone call from the US president.)Have any of the prominent conservatives who spent years lying about the JCPOA yet admitted how wrong they were? Where does Barack go to get his apology?
Even a stopped clock …
I bet that the negotiations are rather without dopamine releasing moments. A lot of important work is and requires sticking to the job when there are more fun things out there. In this vein, MMA rounds are five minutes and a match is three rounds, more for a championship. If the match at the White House takes place, is there an over-under bet for when Trump nods off? I’m thinking third minute of the second round.
The strategist (No, I don’t quite know what that is) Peter Zeihan says that we are not actually dealing directly with Iran but relying on Pakistan to handle the actual negotiations, JD Vance ran away humiliated, Kushner is out and Witkoff is a moron. IIRC the specific Pakistani is an ISI guy, so totally reliable. If true then on any given day, Trump has not a single clue how negotiations are going.
@Michael Reynolds:
And likely Rubio is standing back and going “nope”, unless he gets cleared by Trump to handle it without being backstabbed.
It seems a lot of the “negotiations” are actually going on mainly in Trump’s addled head.
To be fair to Pakistan (and how I hate saying that) they have their own good and various reasons (Pakistan’s economy, relations with China, relations with Saudi’s, keeping onside with Trump, outplaying India, etc) for being reasonably honest brokers in this.
My personal bet is that the whisky consumption budget in Islamabad has increased markedly.
Trump can’t restart the war because the Gulf States won’t let him. He can’t do a peace deal because Netanyahu won’t let him. He can’t just walk away because his MAGA base would crucify him.
A president who posts a torrent of deranged madness on social media 24/7 – among the latest unhinged efforts is a post hailing the brilliance of putting a drone port on the roof of the new White House ballroom, complete with an AI image of the roof covered in (VTOL?) drones, fuel trucks and troops – is clearly off his head. It will be fascinating to observe Republicans in future years explaining why they did nothing to stop an insane man continuing to be President of the United States.
@Modulo Myself:
@Sleeping Dog:
Obviously the (somewhat different) US and Israeli governments ambitions for collapsing Iran have failed.
However, its worth considering the other side of the equation.
Iran has suffered massive economic damage.
Hezbollah also; and Hezbollah is also facing the problems of Syria now being hostile, and a lot other actors in Lebanon inclined to to cut them down to size.
Iran can hope to recover by imposing tolls at Hormuz.
But the question is, even absent the US, why would everyone else acquiesce in this in the longer term?
It’s likely a mistake to think only the US and Iran are the only actors with agency in this.
@Kylopod:
Because that’s “news” and gets a headline.
“Same old shit, different day, and we so f@cked”?
Not so much.
@DK:
That would require a modicum of honesty, humility, and realistic reflection.
In other words, not any time soon.
Though most vaguely sentient can see the reality.
Has it ever occurred to any of those who railed at Obama why exactly the Europeans, who have zero interest in a nuclear Iran, signed on to the JCPOA, and consider Trump’s alternative to be idiotic?
The reason is, exactly as every other US President since Carter, apart from the incumbent idiot, has realised: a war with Iran is not something you can do as a half-measure.
“Go big, or go home”
Or as Napoleon said:
“When you set out to take Vienna, take Vienna”
The alternatives were JCPOA or all-out war.
Trump refused both, and ended up stuck in a dung-heap.
“For three months, President Trump has been deeply engaged in the Iran conflict, planning the 38 days of attack, struggling to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and”
The man is lying, pure and simple.
“Why, oh why, does the press keep trying to kick Lucy’s football claiming a deal with Iran is imminent?”
Ever heard of the website ‘Media Wh*res Online’?
@Ken_L:
And the base wants two incompatible things:
– decisive victory over Iran
– no ground war in Iran
The other periodic flex of both Trmup and MAGA is that “the wretched Euro-weenies should come and dig us out this hole.”
Nope, nope, noppity nope to that genius plan.
@JohnSF:
Because oil at $50-70 a barrel plus the Mullahs’ protection money is still cheaper than oil at $90-100 a barrel?
The problem is not the money. It’s the precedent. Rather the big problem. there’s also the matter of granting Iran a superior strategic position that all other Gulf countries.
There are other choke points in the world’s sea lanes. Perhaps none as crucial as regards oil, fertilizer, and helium, but important nonetheless for international trade in an increasingly global paradigm, El Taco’s Tantrum tariffs notwithstanding.
Or some other small or medium countries might declare a new limit to their territorial waters and charge “tolls” for passage.
@Kathy:
The UAE and Oman spring to mind.
It really opens a whole huge can of worms.
Which is why I suspect in the longer term some other player is liable to tell Iran to gfi.
The Iranian problem is it really needs the money, and the leverage.
Once again, the total incapacity of the Trump administration to work its way down the decision tree is astonishing.
Iran is liable to end up controlling the Straits short run; some other coalition of Powers in the longer term.
Because there are others that have a LOT more vital interests engaged there than does the US.
@Kylopod: They kind of have to do it. To be fair, the media is now often noting that this is the Nth time they are announcing negotiations are back and the Nth time they have stopped. It’s the same thing with the stock market to some extent. If the announcement was real and you missed it you could lose money and there are lost of people making money on the ups and downs (probably especially Trump, family and friends). For my part I am staying longer in energy for a while as I think this goes on for a lot longer before Trump calls it a victory and leaves.
Steve