WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu 's diverging language on Israel's decision to attack a critical Iranian gas field marks the most notable difference of opinion between the two leaders since the start of the 20-day war against Iran.
The attack by Israel on the South Pars gas field prompted Iran to retaliate against energy infrastructure in other Middle East countries. The Iranian strikes led to already elevated global energy prices further surging and spurred Gulf allies to call for Trump to rein in Netanyahu.
The aftermath of the strike left Trump and Netanyahu facing questions on whether they're entirely in sync in prosecuting the war that began as a closely coordinated joint attack on the longtime regional foe. The emergence of daylight — or at least the appearance of it — between the two leaders could shape the balance of the conflict and any eventual endgame.
Trump, during an Oval Office meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, told reporters that he neither agreed with nor approved of Israel's attack on the world’s largest gas field, which is an energy lifeline for Iran.
“I told him, ’Don’t do that,'” Trump said of Netanyahu's decision to strike. “We get along great. It’s coordinated, but on occasion he’ll do something. And if I don’t like it — and so we're not doing that anymore.”
Netanyahu said that Israel “acted alone” and that he's agreed to Trump's request that Israel hold off on any further attack on Iran's giant gas field. The prime minister also sought to downplay any space between him and Trump.
“It’s been said that for 40 years I’ve been saying that Iran is a danger to Israel and a danger to the world. That is true,” Netanyahu said at a news conference in Jerusalem. “You know who else said that? President Trump.”
Netanyahu later added: “Look, I don’t think any two leaders have been as coordinated as President Trump and I. He's the leader. I’m his ally. America is the leader.”
Trump's first public reaction to Wednesday's strike on the Iranian gas field came several hours afterward in a fiery social media post where he also declared the U.S. “knew nothing” about the attack before it was carried out.
Two people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to comment publicly said the U.S. was made aware of Israel's plan ahead of the attack. The people were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. One of the people said Israel's targets are being coordinated with the U.S.
Top U.S. administration officials on Thursday made the case that Trump is simpatico with Netanyahu, but is ultimately guided in his Iran strategy by what he believes is in the U.S. national security interest.
The U.S. air campaign has focused on decimating Iran’s missile program, pummeling its already beleaguered nuclear program and destroying its navy. Israel, meanwhile, has carried out one high-level assassination after another as it looks to topple the Islamic authority that has led the country since 1979.
The prime minister has framed the moment as an opportunity to usher in a new era in the Middle East — one in which the government in Tehran is run by a more moderate leadership that is not hostile to Israel.
Netanyahu is buoyed by an Israeli public that is far more supportive of the war than the American public. That gives him the political leeway to support a sustained operation that could deliver a decisive blow to Iran’s clerical rule.
Though Trump has offered shifting, myriad reasons for the conflict, he's consistently articulated that ensuring that Iran “never has a nuclear weapon” is his primary objective.
“The objectives that have been laid out by the president are different from the objectives that have been laid out by the Israeli government,” Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard noted to House intelligence committee members on Thursday, when asked during a hearing about the White House position on the gas field strike.
Trump, in contrast with Netanyahu, has cooled on the prospects of toppling Iran's clerical authority and paving the way for a more moderate government.
It's been a significant evolution for the president from the start of the U.S. and Israeli bombardment, when he confidently told Iranians that they would soon have an opportunity to rid themselves from the clerical rule of the past 47 years.
But in a Fox News Radio interview last week, Trump was far more measured about the pathway ahead for opponents of the Islamic government and expressed concerns about the paramilitary Basij force, which has played a central role in crushing recent nationwide protests, maintaining its grip as a menacing force in Iran.
“So, I really think that’s a big hurdle to climb for people that don’t have weapons. I think it’s a very big hurdle,” Trump said.
Asked by host Brian Kilmeade if he agreed with Netanyahu's calls for Iranians to take back their country, Trump made clear he didn't think they were ready to rise up. “I would think that Bibi would understand that too," Trump added.
Over the course of Trump's five years in the White House, Netanyahu has arguably been his most steadfast ally among foreign leaders. The Israeli leader, for his part, never misses an opportunity to gush that the Jewish state has never had a more reliable friend in the White House.
But over the last three weeks, Trump and aides have acknowledged the two countries come at the war differently. And Trump has said those differences are natural.
“You know, they’re there, and we’re very far away,” Trump noted.
In the big picture, differences between Trump and Netanyahu are so far largely superficial, said Joel Rubin, a former State Department official in the Obama administration.
The Israeli prime minister has “been trying to figure out how to get American support for many decades" to get behind his push for decapitating strikes on Iran. Trump, Rubin added, is “the first president to say, ’Go for it!'"
Still, the longer the war goes on, the more pressure Trump could face politically and the more rifts could form, Rubin said.
“When the war ends it’s likely gonna be Trump’s call and I do think that we’re probably gonna have a dynamic where, in the future, they’ll have to figure out how to be in sync in terms of identifying and defining when it’s time to end the military operation,” Rubin said of Trump and Netanyahu. “And Israel does not have the same focus on global oil markets as the U.S., and the repercussions.”
AP writer Sam Mednick in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a press conference in Jerusalem, Thursday, March 19, 2026. (Ronen Zvulun, Pool Photo via AP)
President Donald Trump listens as he meets with Japan's Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, March 19, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (AP) — President Donald Trump is set to present the World Cup trophy to the winner of Sunday’s final between Argentina and Spain. But to him, the real victor of soccer’s premier tournament just might be the United States.
“It turned out we were a soccer country, and I think it’s going to remain,” Trump said Friday at a FIFA reception at Trump Tower in New York City. “This has really brought the world together.”
For the White House, Sunday’s match is the culmination of well over a year of navigating a litany of logistical challenges alongside co-hosts Canada and Mexico for what would be the biggest World Cup in history. It had to balance the Trump administration’s hard-line migration policies that barred fans from some World Cup qualifier countries from entry into the United States.
Trump arrived at Sunday's final with a flyover in the presidential helicopter, Marine One. Before the game even kicked off, Trump was already proposing another U.S. bid to host the tournament, sending a nudge to FIFA President Gianni Infantino.
“I had a great idea for Gianni: You have to do two countries. Announce us again next time, and then announce another country after that. It’ll take out some of the anger and the shock,” Trump said on Fox Sports. “Based on the numbers, we will be requesting it again immediately.”
The president declined to pick sides in the final but said it would be difficult to beat Argentine superstar Lionel Messi. Trump got a close look at the World Cup trophy when it was presented to him at his box seat during the first half. Video footage showed the president smiling and patting the gold trophy as it was held up to him. Also in the box were first lady Melania Trump and Infantino, among others.
The White House faced warnings from human rights groups, and the tournament confronted backlash over high ticket prices. For months, Trump flirted with the idea of moving games out of cities that did not cooperate with federal immigration authorities, and in the weeks before the tournament’s start, local authorities sparred with FIFA over high transit costs, heightening tensions even more.
As the first games were preparing to begin, the administration continued to find itself under global scrutiny for its visa decisions, such as denying entry to a referee from Somalia who had won accolades for his officiating. The pressure increased after Trump launched a war with Iran, leaving the administration to grapple with an Iranian team whose fans and some supporting personnel were barred from the U.S, and that ultimately was based across the border in Tijuana.
But the broader story of the World Cup eventually shifted. Social media was flooded with tales of soccer fans from around the world enjoying the treats and traditions of the U.S., from beer to ranch dressing. Some fears about the Trump administration that circulated beforehand, such as the threat of immigration enforcement raids near the games, never materialized.
“One of the things that we talked about beforehand was, if we’re talking about what happened on the pitch, then we’ve done our job,” Andrew Giuliani, the executive director of the White House FIFA Task Force, said in an interview with The Associated Press. “But I think it’s even better than that. We’re not just talking about only the incredible, athletic feats on the pitch, but we’re talking about all these incredible, incredible cultural moments.”
Still, Trump did create controversy with a phone call he made to Infantino earlier this month in which he asked for a review of a controversial referee call in Team USA’s match against Bosnia and Herzegovina. The referee gave a red card to U.S. star forward Folarin Balogun, meaning he wouldn’t be able to play in the subsequent match against Belgium.
Trump says he simply asked Infantino, who has cozied up to the U.S. president and faced backlash for doing so, to review the call. FIFA then reversed the call, and Trump told Infantino at the FIFA reception on Friday that “you made another great decision, if you think about it," because it allowed the U.S. to keep a key player on the field even though the team lost the match to Belgium 4-1.
Giuliani said the administration had a “duty” to ask questions and raise concerns about the officiating process, which drew scrutiny because of the use of video review and slow-motion replay to issue the red card. He noted that the Trump administration invested billions in federal funding to ensure that the World Cup was “not just a safe and secure event, not just where we welcomed the world, but an event that was filled with integrity.”
The Trump administration was under considerable pressure to pull off a successful World Cup tournament because the U.S. will soon host the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles and the 2034 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
The U.S. is also largely expected to be awarded the 2031 Women’s World Cup, although Giuliani said in the AP interview that part of getting those hosting duties will be “ensuring that, in fact, women and only women will play in that 2031 Women’s World Cup” — an allusion to the Trump administration’s fierce opposition to transgender women participating in women’s sports.
Sen. Andy Kim, D-N.J., a self-professed World Cup superfan whose home state is hosting Sunday’s final, noted that logistics for the tournament have gone mostly smoothly, aside from the occasional hiccups on some issues such as transit to the games.
But “overall, just the joy that people have, the excitement that they have, has dramatically outweighed” any downsides, Kim said, who has been eagerly watching the games with his two young sons over the last several weeks.
The U.S. also faced broader tensions with its World Cup co-hosts of Canada and Mexico. Trump announced stiff tariffs on both countries in his return to the White House, and he has chosen not to renew a trade pact among the three countries, setting up a new period of negotiations.
On Friday, Trump threatened to tariff Canada over its wildfires, which have hurt air quality in parts of the U.S., including northern New Jersey where the World Cup final is being held. He joked on Friday that FIFA should choose the U.S. for the World Cup soon again, and “this time, we’ll leave Mexico and Canada out.”
Still, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney attended the final at Trump’s request, in a sign that soccer can overcome some geopolitical tensions.
“I received an invitation from President Trump to attend the World Cup final on Sunday, and I decided to go because it’s a direct invitation from the President of the United States,” Sheinbaum said. “Prime Minister Carney will also be there.”
Trump, as is generally customary for heads of state hosting the tournament, will present the trophy to the eventual winner. But he hasn't tipped his hand publicly about whether he has a preferred team.
Spain is a known irritant to Trump, with its reticence to meet NATO defense spending goals and its refusal to let the U.S. launch strikes against Iran from its bases. Meanwhile, Argentine President Javier Milei is a favorite of the Trump administration, with the U.S. president going as far as to threaten to cut aid to the country if Milei’s coalition didn’t prevail in legislative elections.
Spain’s King Felipe VI, Queen Letizia and Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez attended the game, although Milei — citing superstition — stayed home.
Kim reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Joey Cappelletti in Washington contributed to this report.
President Donald J. Trump stands with FIFA President Gianni Infantino before the World Cup final soccer match between Spain and Argentina in East Rutherford, N.J., near New York, Sunday, July 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)
Pyrotechnics fire as players line up during the pregame ceremony before the World Cup championship final soccer match between Spain and Argentina in East Rutherford, N.J., Sunday, July 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
The Marine One helicopter carrying President Donald Trump, and an escort helicopter, fly over the stadium before the start of the World Cup championship final soccer match between Spain and Argentina, in East Rutherford, N.J., Sunday, July 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney, from left, Mexico's President Claudia Sheinbaum, first lady Melania Trump and President Donald Trump attend the World Cup championship final soccer match between Spain and Argentina in East Rutherford, N.J., Sunday, July 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
President Donald Trump, right, and first lady Melania Trump attend the World Cup championship final soccer match between Spain and Argentina in East Rutherford, N.J., Sunday, July 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
President Donald Trump listens as FIFA President Gianni Infantino speaks at a reception at Trump Tower in New York, Friday, July 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
President Donald Trump listens as FIFA President Gianni Infantino speaks at a reception at Trump Tower in New York, Friday, July 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
