Benjamin Netanyahu faces domestic backlash over US-Iran deal

{"text":[[{"start":9.7,"text":"Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faced a raucous backlash from opponents and allies on Monday after US President Donald Trump announced a deal with Iran that many in Israel view as a capitulation."}],[{"start":22.35,"text":"Trump hailed the agreement to extend the ceasefire and reopen the Strait of Hormuz — to be signed on Friday in Switzerland after weeks of fractious negotiations and intermittent outbreaks of fighting — as a “Great Deal” that would “bring Peace and Security to the whole Region”."}],[{"start":38.75,"text":"But in Israel the news was met with a mix of anger and frustration across the political spectrum that the US president had again forced the country into a humiliating truce before it had achieved any of its war goals. "}],[{"start":53.3,"text":"The deal also put Israel under pressure to halt its campaign against the Iran-backed Hizbollah militant group in Lebanon. Netanyahu and his allies have repeatedly sought to delink the fight with Hizbollah from the Iran war and continue striking across Lebanon."}],[{"start":67.89999999999999,"text":"After two days of silence, Netanyahu on Monday launched a fierce defence of his wartime policies going back nearly three years, insisting the Iran war had been a success while avoiding overt criticism of Trump and the recent US-Iran accord. "}],[{"start":83.14999999999999,"text":"“He’s the president of the United States, I’m the prime minister of Israel. Many times we see eye to eye, there are also instances where we see less eye to eye. I’m responsible for the security interests of Israel and I uphold them . . . not with outbursts but with wisdom,” Netanyahu said. "}],[{"start":101.44999999999999,"text":"“This deal was done by the president of the United States . . . it was his decision and he’s leading it. I expressed my opinion in our conversations,” he added."}],[{"start":111.04999999999998,"text":"But some Israeli commentators disputed Netanyahu’s ability to influence the US leader before the deal was agreed as well as Israel’s freedom of operations once it comes into effect."}],[{"start":121.49999999999999,"text":"“[Trump] compelled Israel to accept an inconvenient ceasefire in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran,” the commentator Nahum Barnea wrote in the centrist daily Yedioth Ahronoth. “Along the way, he demoted Israel from the status of an ally to that of a servant: one whose services are utilised but whose opinion is disregarded. Its role is to obey and to say thank you politely.”"}],[{"start":null,"text":"

"}],[{"start":147.1,"text":"When Trump and Netanyahu launched their joint campaign against Iran in late February, Netanyahu told Israelis the war would bring “true peace”, remove the threat posed by Tehran’s missile and nuclear programmes and help topple the regime."}],[{"start":160.79999999999998,"text":"But Netanyahu’s domestic opponents excoriated the Israeli prime minister for the fact that none of those goals had been reached. "}],[{"start":167.04999999999998,"text":"Yair Lapid, head of the centrist Yesh Atid party, branded the agreement “one of the most shocking failures of Israel’s foreign and security policy”."}],[{"start":176.39999999999998,"text":"“[Netanyahu] continues to tell everyone: “We changed the Middle East.” The problem is that due to negligence, arrogance, the absence of a suitable professional team, and judgment influenced by other things — he changed it for the worse,” Lapid wrote on X."}],[{"start":190.24999999999997,"text":"The head of the leftwing Democrats, Yair Golan, said: “In one signature stroke, immense military achievements secured with the courage of our pilots and the blood of our fighters have been erased, while Netanyahu stood on the sidelines.”"}],[{"start":205.09999999999997,"text":"“Netanyahu is good for Hamas. Netanyahu is good for Iran. Netanyahu is good for Hizbollah. Netanyahu is not good for Israel,” he wrote on X."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":216.19999999999996,"text":"Other members of Netanyahu’s far-right government struck a defiant tone. Defence minister Israel Katz insisted that, despite the truce, Israel would not withdraw from the territory it has seized in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza, but would instead remain there “indefinitely”."}],[{"start":233.14999999999995,"text":"“The area will be cleared of local residents, and all terror infrastructure, above and below ground — including the homes in the contact-line villages that served as terror outposts — will be destroyed,” he said. “The seizure of territory and the security zones are among the [Israel military]’s greatest achievements in the [war].”"}],[{"start":251.14999999999995,"text":"Meanwhile, national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir urged Netanyahu not to let Trump’s deal bind Israel “in any way”."}],[{"start":258.94999999999993,"text":"“We love the USA and are grateful to President Trump. And yet, the State of Israel is not a banana republic,” he wrote on X. "}],[{"start":266.5999999999999,"text":"However, others were scornful of the idea that an increasingly isolated Israel could afford to defy Trump in a significant way. Barnea said Israel’s strikes in Beirut on Sunday were “unrelated to Hizbollah” but were “important for Netanyahu to show his voters that he doesn’t obey Trump’s every command”. "}],[{"start":286.44999999999993,"text":"He added: “He is a servant playing at rebellion. This rebellion won’t go very far. Trump is all we have left in America after three years of war. It is unwise to push him into the Iranians’ arms.”"}],[{"start":304.09999999999997,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1781580379_9196.mp3"}