Domestic Pressures and Future Outlook

It's considered this, where every day we go deep on one big news story Today, what Israel wants out of the war with Iran? Now they've called it quits, so they're gonna Lets leave each other alone for another week or something As he was about to get onto a plane, early Tuesday morning, President Trump said that Israel and Iran had both agreed thanks to his pressure to stop attacking each other. And he said a deal to end the war was maybe only two or three days away in the final thrones of what will be a very, very good deal. There is no evidence that a deal is close, and in fact, hours later, Israel's military struck sites across southern Lebanon, where it has been fighting the Iran backed militia Hezbollah. One of Iran's demands in a peace deal is the end of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah. Over the weekend, Israel fired missiles at Iran, because Iran fired missiles at Israel, because Israel had fired at Hezbollah targets near Beirut, because Hezbollah had fired on northern Israel You get the picture. A am of v anitam That is Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is speaking Monday in a video statement and saying, our battle against Iran and Hezbollah is still not finished In the last twenty four hours, they tried to impose a new equation upon us, and it is an equation I find intolerable and unacceptable Consider this, Trump and Netanyahu started the war with Iran together. Today, Trump wants a speedy end to that war, Netanyahu does not appear to agree From NPR, I' Mary Louise Kelly NPR's tiny desk can't come to you. I mean it's a desk, but the tiny desk contest tour can. New York City join NPR's tiny desesk contest winner, Cure for Paranoia at Warsaw this july ninth. It's all the NPR tiny Desk ennergy minus the office furniture Get your tickets now at tinydesktour. org This week on sources and methods six prime ministers in ten years. Since Brexit, the UK has been trapped in a revolving door of political turmoil. We're unpacking what the exit of Prime Minister Kir Starmer says about the populist movement that pulled Britain away from Europe Listen now to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts And It's consider this from NPR. President Trump has claimed he doesn't care about the midterm elections with respect to how the war with Iran will impact Republicans running for office. But the war is not popular in the US. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu also faces elections this fall and the Israeli public pressing for military defeat of Iran and its allies, including Hezbollah We're going to hear now from someone with deep experience, navigating US. Israel relelations, Daniel Shapiro. He was US. ambassador to Israel in the Obama administration, and he is here with me in the studio today. Welcome, Abassador. Thanks, good to be with you. President Trump's top priority seems to be ending the war. He just this morning said a peace deal is two or three days away. It's not clear exactly what he's basing that on, but that's what he says Israel share that goal ending the war and ending it fast The Israeli preference would be to continue the war. Why They would like to see Iran essentially defeated in a more lasting way The war started with the target really of bringing down the regime, at least from the Israeli perspective certainly doing devastating damage to the nuclear program so that it could not be reconstituted in any significant way and wiping out a ballistic missile threat that had really emerged as a very significant strategic problem for Israel In the end, once Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz, that became the primary strategic objective for the United States because it was causing global economic chaos, driving gas prices up at home, creating political problems for President Trump. So that's a divergence between U. S. and Israeli interests, which you can see playing out now in the way the Prime Minister talks about what he wants to achieve, tried to do some additional strikes just over the weekend, and President Trump's desire to wind this down. So what you're saying is the U President Trump, to be more specific, President Trump would like to end the war reopen the strait of Hormz, let's get a peace deal, let's get it done. Israel wants something bigger, more permanent those two goals have now diverged Does the US hold more leverage here in terms of how and when this war ends? I'm thinking of another thing President Trump just said recently about Netanyahu, and I'm quoting, he'll do whatever I want him to do. Certainly President Trump has the upper hand here. Prime Minister Netanyahuu has portrayed himself to the Israeli people as Donald Trump's best friend, right hand and them as a duo who together are making decisions on the Middle East's future Now that that divergence has opened up, it's very difficult for the Pime Mister to present himself still as deeply aligned with the president. But he can't really go against him He has so fused his political identity with his relationship with President Trump, and he's now heading into a very challenging election If he were to be belittled in some way or represented as the junior partner who takes orders from President Trump, essentially compromising Israel's ability to make sovereign decisions in its own security, because President Trump says no, that's very damaging for him politically as a longime watcher of Benjamin Netanyahu, how surprising have these last few days been to you in terms of watching Israel's prime Mister being, to use your word, belittled by the president of the United States? Pimeister Netanyahu would not have responded the same way During the Obama presidency, when I was the ambassador, he would not have responded the same way during President Biden's administration either He at that time may have felt he had leverage both in his own domestic politics to be in a fight with those presidents who is easier to criticize as somehow falling short on their commitment to Israel security. He also might have had leverage in Washington where he could have gone to Republicans to criticize a Democratic president Now he has nowhere to go in Washington. No Republicans are going to go against President Trump. We know that. and Democrats want the war to end And at home, he therefore, doesn't have the same leverage to position himself in opposition to an American president. It would actually do damage to him. So I want to stay with elections. Both countries have elections coming up this fall. President Trump, as we mentioned, would like to bring this unpopular war, unpopular here in the US to a close, and he would ideally like to do it before the midterms It sounds like it's different. in Israel. Wh Israeli since october seventh when Hamas attacked from Gaza have adopted a security doctrine that says threats that present themselves then that deadly away must be eliminated. They can't simply be tolerated over the border. So they've, of course conducted the war in Gaza ferociously. They've also conducted a war in Lebanon against Hezbollah, which is attacked across Israel's northern border and had several rounds and exchanges with Iran. And the idea is that thoseose threats need to actually be eliminated, not just managed. So going into an election when it's clear that on none of those fronts have the threats been eliminated? That's a very frustrating place for Israelis to find themselves and certainly cuts against Prime Minister Netanyahu's presentation of himself to the Israeli public as the one leader who can manage Israelcure saf. One who can keep you safe, That's right. Help us understand because it is so complicated, the way that the two fronts are interereded byy which I mean the Iran war launched together by the US. and Israel. and Israel's fight in Lebanon They're separate. they deeply related how much of Netanyahu's calculus in terms of continuing the fight in Lebanon has to do with he doesn't really want the war to end in Iran, at least not on the terms that President Trump might be willing to end it. In fairness, Hezbollah, which really is a prox of Iran and pursuing Iran's interests, not Lebanon's interests. In fact, the Lebanese government declared itself against what Hezbollah is doing, Heizboll has continued to attack Israel, and so any Israeli leader would feel that theyd have to respond And it is true that Iran has tried to link these two and say that it will only agree to a ceasefire if it knows that Israel has stopped its campaign against Hezbollah But it works the other way as well. If Netanyahu continues the fight, and this happened earlier in the week, when he decided to strike in the Beirut suburbs that Hezbollah has a stronghold, Iran decided that was a redline for them. They launched missiles against Israel. That led to the exchange back and forth, which s President Trump had to sort of blow the whistle and shut down So for both Iran and for Israel, Lebanon becomes a theater which is actually linked and can keep this war going or will have to be embedded into the ceasefire that ends the war altogether. One other factor to mention here is that Netanyahuu has corruption charges hanging over him. These are charges that go back years back to twenty twenty allegations of bribery, of fraud and so forth. explain how those charges may be factoring into his political calculations Listeners may be surprised to understand that the war might not be the number one issue on many Israeli voters' minds. You mentioned the corruption charges that have been part of a trial that has been going on for years Also very controversial is that Netanyahu seems prepared to provide a blanket and permanent exemption for military service portion of his coalition, the ultra Orthodox parties, whose man instead of serving the military preferred to spend their time in religious studies. very unpopular with the rest of Israeli society that has been serving for hundreds of days during the course of this war, and that thinks the burden should be shared equally So many Israelis are angry at Netanyahu for those two things. and what he may think is that the way he holds on to right wing voters who are unhappy with his giving away of this draft exemption, who are unhappy with his corruption still concerned about Israel's security and addressing the threats. and so maybe he can hold on to those swing voters, potential swing voters. by continuing the fight against these hated enemies. I mean, it sounds like what you're saying is that what holds true in U.S. politics is also true in many other countries, including Israel. When a leader, when a president, finds himself constrained by Congress here in the U. S.. He has more leeway on foreign policy. The same is true in In Israel, it sounds like a Prime Minister Netanyu It's true, although it doesn't cut cleanly. Many Israelis are also exhausted by these wars and are perhaps coming to the reluctant conclusion that there isn't going to be a definitive outcome. And these enemies aren't going to be just defeated completely and again, they'll have to return to a policy of having to manage those threats So while it's true that that inclination perhaps pushes him to try to continue the war. It may serve his politics in the short term The The broader look at Israeli society shows a society really exhausted and needing a break. And I actually think in the end, his pursuit of fruitless campaigns, which are not actually advancing toward final outcomes, may in the end become as much of a burden on him as some of the other burdens he's carrying around the military draft issue and around corruption. So what is the relationship between these two men now Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump. How much of what we perceived from here as what looks like a rift is political theater versus real disagreement? There's some of both. It's clear there's a divergence of interests. That's absolutely clear. There's also a little bit of a good cop, bad cop game that the two of them have played. They talk very frequently, and so it's certainly possible to have disagreements, but continue to be partners that we've seen that before