Trump says he swore at Netanyahu over Lebanon attacks

Paul Wallace, Bloomberg News on Jun 3, 2026

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Donald Trump said he swore at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a call this week as the U.S. president tried to deescalate fighting in Lebanon and keep peace talks with Iran on track.

“I did,” Trump said in an interview with the Pod Force One podcast, responding to a question about whether he directed expletives toward Netanyahu, widely known as Bibi, and called him crazy.

“I was a little bit perturbed at him constantly fighting with Lebanon,” Trump said on the podcast, aired on Wednesday. “At some point, I said: ‘Bibi, we have to stop this.’”

Trump added he “liked Bibi a lot” and denied the Israeli leader had “tricked” him into attacking Iran.

“I’m the one that started it,” Trump said. “I started it because they can’t have a nuclear weapon. If it wasn’t me, there would be no Israel right now.”

The call took place on Monday, after Iran threatened to suspend talks with the U.S. and increase restrictions on maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz because of Israel’s threats to bomb Beirut, Lebanon’s capital.

Axios first reported the details of the call, which an Israeli official briefed on the matter later confirmed to Bloomberg.

Israel is fighting Tehran-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon. They fired drones at cities in the north of the Jewish state, forcing thousands of civilians to flee their homes, shortly after the U.S. and Israel started bombing Iran in late February.

Israel’s subsequent strikes on and ground invasion of Lebanon have killed more than 3,000 people and displaced over a million. Hezbollah is one of the most powerful non-state actors in the world and designated a terrorist organization by the U.S.

Trump, who also spoke to representatives of Hezbollah on Monday, said the Islamist group and Israel had agreed to stop firing on one another and Israeli forces had backed off on raiding Beirut.

Since Netanyahu and Trump talked, fighting in southern Lebanon has continued. But Israel has refrained from hitting Beirut and Hezbollah’s drone attacks on Israel itself have waned.