Don't Blame Netanyahu for Trump's Actions

By Jessie Seigel / Washington, D.C.

Originally appeared in My Washington Whispers on April 14, 2026

As I see it, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is to Israel what President Donald Trump is to the United States.

Like Trump, who has power despite huge democratic opposition, Netanyahu is opposed by a huge number of Israelis. Each of these men is corrupt and clinging to power in order to avoid prosecution. And taking actions that may well destroy their countries.

But I am sick and tired of being informed—whether by some casual Facebook post, by cable news or by respected entities like the New York Times or the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace that Netanyahu is a Svengali who manipulates Trump into launching wars like the current one against Iran.

Furthermore, for Trump’s Secretary of State Marco Rubio to suggest that Israel pulled Trump into the United States’ current Iran fiasco is particularly galling. First, it is an established modus operandi for Trump to blame others for the unpopularity or failure of any of his decisions. Second, why would one take anything said by a representative of Trump’s regime at face value?

Trump has demonstrated over and over that he never does anything he doesn’t believe will benefit him personally in some way.  Ditto for those around him. It is likely that the U.S. entered into this misbegotten war based on an assortment of motives held by diverse Trump factions, among them: to feed Trump’s ego; to distract from the Epstein files; to invite an attack on the U.S. in order to declare martial law and/or cancel the 2026 midterm election; to steal Iran’s oil; to hurry fulfillment of the Christian nationalists’ end-time prophecies; as well as Pete Hegseth’s desire to play soldier at the expense of real soldiers.

And that’s before one even examines the Manchurian Candidate aspect of Trump’s relationship with Vladimir Putin and the fact that Putin benefits immensely by the U.S. failure, its falling out with NATO over the attack, and the depletion of our nation’s weapon stocks.

The bottom line: Trump and his cabal had their own reasons to attack Iran and should be held responsible for their own actions. It is obnoxious to attempt to lessen their responsibility by suggesting that they were victims of Netanyahu’s manipulation.

That claim reeks of antisemitic stereotype: the sneaky Jew, the clever Jew, the Jews who, behind the scenes, run the world.

Add to this the resurgence of claims on left and right that Israel has bought our nation’s politicians. Some, as usual, decry the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s (AIPAC) lobbying efforts. This is a version of the never-ending charge that Jews have too much influence. And an implication that American Jews have double loyalties.

One is sorely tempted to ask why neither the left nor the right have ever decried Saudi Arabia’s use, for decades, of its oil wealth to effectively lobby to influence US-Middle East policy and politicians, as well as American business interests and private institutions.

Arab and Muslim Americans have as much right as Jewish Americans and every other American to lobby the government in the interest of a cause or a place they care about. Neither should be castigated as unamerican or accused of undue influence when they do so. But Saudi Arabia is a foreign nation.  And their lobbying, unlike AIPAC’s, has always largely stayed below the media’s radar.  

As for the extremism of the Netanyahu government—whether in Gaza or as relates to its entry into the current war with Iran--I do not defend it. Or excuse it. Probably, Netanyahu’s political ambition and legal problems factored greatly into his decisions.

Nevertheless, I do have some thoughts to explain, historically, what, in my view, may have brought Israel’s government to this extreme point.

In 1956, Golda Meir, then Foreign Minister of Israel, addressing the United Nations General Assembly, stated, in part:

"A comfortable division has been made. The Arab states unilaterally enjoy the “rights of war”; Israel has the unilateral responsibility of keeping the peace. But belligerency is not a one-way street. Is it then surprising if a people laboring under this monstrous distinction should finally become restive and at last seek a way of rescuing its life from the perils of the regulated war that is conducted against it from all sides?"

Throughout the decades since, not much changed. For the most part, attacks on Israelis were not covered by the media until Israel responded. And then, the response would almost always be labeled “retaliation.” As if Israel’s responses were simply tit for tat rather than an effort to stop the attacks on its citizens. And, of course, the term “retaliation” easily feeds into the Christian stereotype of the vengeful Jew.

That was very often followed by the world’s demands that Israel show “restraint.” I do not recall restraint ever publicly being demanded, or even asked, of the other side.

In her 1956 speech, Golda Meir also said:

"Over and over again, the Israeli government has held out its hand in peace to its neighbors. But to no avail.'.

So often since then, the Israelis attempted to make peace with the Arab states and work out the situation of the Palestinians. There were a few temporary advances—but very few.

In 1979, Israel’s Prime Minister Menachem Begin (notably, the then leader of the right-wing Likud party) and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat signed a Peace Treaty. Subsequently, Sadat was assassinated by his own for his effort. This was followed by what was called a “cold peace” with Egypt.

In 1993, Israeli Prime Minister Itzak Rabin (of the Labor party) and Palestine Liberation Organization chairman Yassar Arafat signed the Oslo Accords. Shortly after, Rabin was assassinated by an Israeli extremist.  Perhaps Israel and the Palestinian Authority could still have successfully moved forward. But while the Palestinian Authority was elected on the West Bank, Gaza chose the Iran-backed terrorist group Hamas, which has consistently sworn to annihilate Israel.

Attacks by Hamas and by Hezbollah, also backed by Iran, continued.

Since its beginning, Israel has lived with the persistent attempts to annihilate it. Iran and its surrogates have not only consistently expressed that intent, but have  acted upon it at every opportunity. Is it surprising then, that after 78 years of this, some portion of Israel’s citizenry would turn hardline, even if the majority still favor seeking a peaceful resolution?

Perhaps, for those in Netanyahu’s government, the October 7, 2023, massacre and kidnappings by Hamas was a final straw. Perhaps the restraint to try to “keep the peace” that Golda Meir referenced in 1956 not only wore thin but finally broke.

Acknowledging this possibility does not constitute a defense of the Netanyahu government’s post October 7 actions in Gaza or the recent choice to attack Iran. Rather, it is requesting of the reader an acknowledgment that any other nation might well, under such strain, behave in the same manner.

What’s sad is the loss of all the years when honest negotiation and compromise by Israel’s surrounding states could have avoided bringing the conflict to this point.

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Jessie Seigel’s journalistic career began with the political Washington Whispers column, written for The Insider. Since The Insider ended its run in 2023, Seigel has continued the column as My Washington Whispers,

www.mywashingtonwhispers.com. In addition, Seigel has had a long career as a government attorney, has received two Artist’s Fellowships from the Washington, D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities for her fiction, has been a finalist for several literary awards, and has had professional staged readings of her plays, Tinker's Damn, and The Three Jessies. More on Seigel can be found at www.jessieseigel.com.