President Donald Trump cursed at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a roughly 15-minute phone call on Monday, angered by Israel's escalation in Lebanon and its potential to derail ongoing nuclear negotiations with Iran. Multiple sources familiar with the call told ABC News that Trump accused Netanyahu of being ungrateful and called him "crazy."
At one point during the tense exchange, Trump asked Netanyahu, "What the f--- are you doing?" Axios first reported on the expletive-filled call.
The call came as Iran threatened to walk away from negotiations entirely. The semi-official Tasnim news agency reported that "The Iranian negotiating team will suspend 'talks and the exchange of texts through mediators.'" Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi did not confirm the report but posted on X saying that a "ceasefire between Iran and the U.S. is unequivocally a ceasefire on all fronts, including in Lebanon." The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps also said in a statement that Iran "considers crossing the red lines in Lebanon and Gaza to mean direct war."
Trump brushed the warnings off, insisting he "couldn't care less." But behind the scenes, the president told senior administration officials he wanted to speak with Netanyahu, furious that an escalation in Lebanon could derail any progress made in the talks. The president had just made edits to a proposed peace plan and sent it to Iran for consideration.
After Monday's call, Netanyahu released a statement. "I spoke with President Trump this evening and told him that if Hezbollah does not stop attacking our cities and citizens, Israel will attack terror targets in Beirut," he said. "Our position remains the same. At the same time, the IDF will continue to operate as planned in southern Lebanon," Netanyahu added.
By Tuesday, a senior Iranian military officer said that a return to hostilities in the war with the United States seems inevitable, saying "the Iranian nation will never surrender," according to CBS News. Iran was still considering the most recent draft of a potential agreement with the United States and had yet to respond, a source close to the negotiating team told a state news agency Tuesday.
Despite Trump's claim that Netanyahu had agreed to halt fighting, Israel and Hezbollah clashed overnight. Trump posted on social media later Monday that he had a conversation with Netanyahu "asking him not to go into a major raid of Beirut, Lebanon. He turned his Troops around. Thank you Bibi!" Earlier, following the call, Trump also posted that talks with Iran were continuing at "a rapid pace."
Monday's call was not the first time the two leaders had a tense conversation. Trump's frustrations with Netanyahu have boiled over in previous instances where Israel has taken action against Iran and its proxies. Meanwhile, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps confirmed Tuesday that it had targeted the MSC Sariska V container ship the previous day, in retaliation for a U.S. attack on the Iranian vessel M/V Lian Star in the Sea of Oman. The ship's owner confirmed the cargo vessel was hit by two projectiles off Iraq's coast. The IRGC also said 24 vessels had transited the Strait of Hormuz over the previous 24 hours after obtaining authorization and coordinating with its naval forces. Iran has been charging ships what it calls service fees for use of the waterway, which before the war typically saw around one-fifth of the world's gas and oil supplies pass through on tankers.
Israeli arms exports also reached a new record, the country's defense ministry announced Tuesday. Exports hit more than $19 billion in 2025, a nearly 30 percent surge compared to the previous year, driven by sales of missile, rocket and air defense systems. It was the fifth consecutive year Israel set an all-time export record.
