US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are at loggerheads over Israel’s strike on a key Iranian gas field, marking their most significant disagreement since the start of the 20-day conflict with Iran, according to the AP.
What happened in the last hours? The best update
- Global benchmark Brent crude has risen more than 60% since Israel and the United States went to war against Iran. Meanwhile, Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon have killed more than 1,000 people as fighting with the militant group Hezbollah has intensified.
- Israel’s attack on the South Pars gas field triggered Iranian retaliation against energy facilities across the Middle East, pushing already high global energy prices even higher. Netanyahu said Israel and the United States had “won” the war against Iran and claimed the country had been “decimated” and lost key military capabilities, according to AFP. “We are winning and Iran is decimated,” he said. Netanyahu also stated, “Iran no longer has the capacity to enrich uranium and produce ballistic missiles,” adding that Israel is targeting “industrial sectors that enable the production of missiles.”
- Qatar’s energy minister said attacks on the country’s power facilities would reduce its liquefied natural gas (LNG) export capacity by 17 percent and take three to five years to repair, AFP reported. “We will be forced to declare force majeure for up to five years on some long-term LNG contracts,” Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi said in a statement.
- He commented on the coordination with US President Donald Trump: “I don’t think any two leaders have been as coordinated as President Trump and I. He’s the leader. I’m, you know, his ally.” Netanyahu rejected claims that he influenced Trump’s involvement, saying, “Does anyone really think that anyone can tell President Trump what to do?” and added, “He needed no persuasion.”
Trump said Israel would not launch further attacks
US President Donald Trump urged Israel not to carry out further attacks on Iran’s natural gas infrastructure as retaliatory strikes on energy facilities sent global prices soaring and deepened the US-Israel conflict with Iran.
But he said he told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to repeat the attack on energy infrastructure. “I told him, ‘Don’t do it,’ and he won’t do it,” he told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday, AFP reported.
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