Former President Donald Trump heaped criticism on Benjamin Netanyahu, saying the Israeli prime minister has been "rightfully criticized" for Iranian-backed Hamas' Oct. 7 terrorist attack.
Trump said the attack, in which at least 1,200 Israeli civilians were massacred and about 250 others taken hostage, should never have happened and blamed Netanyahu for not seeing it coming.
"I think it's had a profound impact on him, despite everything," Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, said in an interview with Time published Tuesday. "Because people said that shouldn't have happened. They have the most sophisticated equipment. They had — everything was there to stop that.
"And a lot of people knew about it, you know, thousands and thousands of people knew about it, but Israel didn't know about it, and I think he's being blamed for that very strongly. And now you have the hostage situation."
Since the terror attack, Israel has been conducting a military operation in the Gaza Strip to eradicate Hamas and rescue the remaining hostages, believed to be about 133. But Trump said he fears few of the remaining hostages are alive.
"I happen to think that on the hostages, knowing something about the enemy, and knowing something about people, I think you have very few hostages left," Trump said "… I think the hostages are going to be far fewer than people think, which is a very sad thing."
Trump was a staunch supporter of Israel during his presidency — he recognized Jerusalem as the nation's capital, moving the U.S. embassy there; approved of Israel's annexation of the Golan Heights; and backed the historic Abraham Accords peace agreement between Israel and several Arab nations. But he said he had a bad experience with Netanyahu regarding the killing of Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani via a U.S. drone strike at an Iraqi airport in January 2020.
"As you probably know by now, he dropped out just before the attack," Trump said. "And I said, 'What's that all about?' Because that was going to be a joint [operation] and all of a sudden, we were told that Israel was not doing it. And I was not happy about that. That was something I never forgot. And it showed me something."
Michael Katz ✉
Michael Katz is a Newsmax reporter with more than 30 years of experience reporting and editing on news, culture, and politics.
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