#benjamin netanyahu

Andrew Roth at The Guardian:

Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has rejected a US-backed 15-point peace plan for Gaza in a rare public break with Donald Trump. In a statement on Sunday, Netanyahu said that he was confronting a “wave of rumours about Israeli weakness and Israeli withdrawals on all fronts” and rebuked US pressure to end wars in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran without Israel’s buy-in. On Gaza, he said: “Israel does not accept the 15-point document. The IDF will not carry out any withdrawal until Hamas is disarmed. And when I say the disarming of Hamas, it means heavy weaponry, lighter weaponry, all weaponry. And we are talking about genuine disarmament, not fictitious disarmament. Right now, we are talking with the Americans about this issue.” Trump’s Board of Peace in July proposed the 15-point plan, which mandated that Hamas disarm in exchange for providing a full Israeli military withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and an eventual transition of power to an independent Palestinian National Committee. Trump had said that the agreement would be implemented in stages, but Netanyahu on Sunday said that he wanted a full disarmament first in order to implement the deal.

The Israeli leader’s main target in his remarks was the US. Israel has emerged as a key stumbling block in the Trump White House’s plans to broker peace in the region, in Israel’s conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon as well as in the war begun by joint US-Israeli strikes on Iran. And Netanyahu, who is facing tough elections in October and pressure from hardliners in his own government, appears ready to test his relationship with Trump in public in order to shore up his reputation as a defender of Israel at home. Israel had already signalled that it would reject the US-led plan. Soon after Trump announced it last month, Israel stepped up its bombing campaign in the Palestinian territory – strikes killed 18 people last Sunday. Netanyahu’s office had previously indicated it would not back the plan, saying: “The version that has been made public does not reflect Israel’s positions.” But Sunday’s rejection was far more forceful and direct, and appeared targeted at the Trump White House, as Trump and Netanyahu both face difficult elections. “Unlike all those who lecture us, we do what needs to be done for Israel’s security, and we can and know how to stand our ground, even against our best friends when necessary,” Netanyahu said.

The head of Trump’s Board of Peace hit back on Sunday, saying the plan remained the “only way forward”. Nickolay Mladenov, the board’s high representative for Gaza, told Israeli television: “The option we are offering today is the only way forward that ensures this tragedy does not happen again.”

Alan Zendell, August 8, 2026 No, this is not about the 1987 Kevin Costner/Gene Hackman film of the same name. But President Trump seems to have no more options than Costner did when struggling to survive as the target of a corrupt general. Trump has gotten himself into a pickle that only an irrational narcissist like him could have. Since starting his war against Iran, Trump as usual ignored the…