Netanyahu talked Graham out of lobbying Trump to join war on Hezbollah – report
Documentary footage seen by WSJ shows late GOP senator boasting about president excitement following first US-Israeli strikes on Iran; doubting envoys Witkoff, Kushner in talks
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu talked the late Republican senator Lindsey Graham out of convincing US President Donald Trump to join Israel’s fight against Hezbollah in Lebanon, according to unaired footage seen by The Wall Street Journal.
Graham, a staunchly pro-Israel senator from South Carolina and longtime friend of both Netanyahu and Trump, was followed by a documentary film crew during the first days of this year’s US-Israeli war with Iran. Footage of the film was obtained by the Journal, which published a short clip on its site.
In the clip, Graham boasts to his staff that Trump was thrilled after launching major strikes with Israel against Iran on February 28.
“I talked to Trump this morning. He’s jacked. He said, ‘Best thing I have ever done.’ He loves blowing stuff up,” Graham says.
“How long have we been pushing this?” Graham asks his staff, rhetorically, alluding to his many years of lobbying for the US to go to war with Iran.
Graham says he was fighting with “a lot of people inside” the Trump administration who were against the Iran war, and that Republicans were not backing the war firmly enough.
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“Very few people are out selling this war from the administration. I’m shocked,” he says.
Graham also seemed to suggest that top White House aides Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff could not be trusted in diplomatic efforts in the Middle East.
“I can’t do it with Jared, and I can’t do it with Witkoff. They’re just too conflicted. It’s gotta be [US Secretary of State Marco] Rubio,” he told Joe Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan, according to the report.
It was unclear whether Graham was referring to conflicts of interest the two had, or merely saying they were internally conflicted in some manner.
At one point in March, Graham planned to fly to Florida in order to convince Trump to join Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah, but Netanyahu talked him out of it in a March 4 call, the Journal said, detailing other portions of the film not aired by the outlet.
“We’re concentrating right now on Iran,” Netanyahu says in the footage.
“If we tell Hezbollah that we’re going all the way, we threaten them, but if we actually do it, then they have no reason not to go all the way against us. And right now that’s not our interest,” Netanyahu says.
Graham also told Netanyahu that it would be time to normalize ties with Saudi Arabia once the Iranian regime falls, but the prime minister said to focus on Iran first, the report said.
The late senator also flew to Saudi Arabia to try to get Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman’s support for the Iran war.
Only weeks before he died earlier in July, Graham worried that Trump was flubbing the war effort.
“He’s letting this thing slip away,” the senator said. “I got to go talk to him.”
Graham, who spent decades advocating for Israel in the US halls of power, died unexpectedly of heart failure at age 71.
Netanyahu is set to fly to Washington to attend his memorial service and meet with Trump this week.
The Times of Israel Community.