President Donald Trump has raged at Israel and Iran after the “complete and total” ceasefire he announced on Monday evening immediately broke down, with the two sides accusing each other of violations.
The chaos led to Trump telling reporters on the South Lawn of the White House Tuesday morning that neither side “knows what the f*** they’re doing.”
“Iran violated it, but Israel violated it too. Israel, as soon as we made the deal, they came out and they dropped a load of bombs the likes of which I’ve never seen before. The biggest load that we’ve seen,” he said, visibly angry.
“I’m not happy with Israel. You know, when I say ‘OK, you have 12 hours,’ you don’t go out in the first hour and just drop everything you have on them. So I’m not happy with them. I’m not happy with Iran either.
“But I’m really unhappy with Israel going out this morning because of one rocket that didn’t land. That was shot, perhaps by mistake, and didn’t land. I’m not happy about that.”
He continued: “You know what? We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f*** they’re doing, do you understand that?”
Trump then turned away and marched towards the helicopter, ignoring further questions shouted by the press corps. He is traveling on from Joint Base Andrews aboard Air Force One to the Netherlands, where he will attend a NATO summit in The Hague.
Moments before the outburst, he had singled out Israel for criticism on Truth Social, posting: “ISRAEL. DO NOT DROP THOSE BOMBS. IF YOU DO IT IS A MAJOR VIOLATION. BRING YOUR PILOTS HOME, NOW! DONALD J. TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.”
The fragile truce was announced on Monday, just hours after Iran launched missile strikes on an American military base in Qatar in revenge for the U.S. bombing three of its nuclear sites over the weekend.
The question of whether Trump’s administration should support Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Operation Rising Lion offensive has caused a bitter divide within the president’s MAGA coalition, with the likes of Tucker Carlson, Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Steve Bannon, and former congressman Matt Gaetz finding themselves at odds with Republican hawks.
The news of the ceasefire was greeted with expressions of relief by Carlson and dismay by others like conservative radio host Mark Levin, who complained that Iran’s Supreme Leader had been granted a reprieve: “I hate this word ceasefire... Adolf Hitler wasn’t thrown a lifeline.”
Trump was warmly congratulated for forging the deal by anti-war conservatives, at least two of whom, Alabama Senator Katie Britt and ex-Fox News anchor Glenn Beck, suggested the president should be rewarded with the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts.
White House adviser Stephen Miller, meanwhile, praised his boss’s “historic” achievement and “bold, courageous action”, which he said had been realized without a loss of life or single messaging leak.
Trump and U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had claimed that Saturday night’s Operation Midnight Hammer, which saw American B-2 bombers drop “bunker buster” explosions on three Iranian nuclear sites, was a total success, effectively ending the country’s alleged ambitions of developing a weapon of mass destruction.
However, subsequent satellite imagery has revealed that, although the Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan facilities were badly damaged by the bombing raid, the devastation does not appear to be quite as severe as the president and Hegseth had indicated.
What happens next is unclear, but U.K. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, who will meet Trump at the summit, has pleaded for both Israel and Iran to observe the ceasefire.
“I want the ceasefire to continue, and therefore, obviously, the sooner we get back to that, the better,” he said.
“And that's the message that I'm discussing with others leaders today. We need to get back to that ceasefire.”
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