Does anyone else have foreign-policy whiplash? I know I certainly do.
In just a matter of hours, U.S. President Donald Trump went from authorizing unprecedented airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities to absorbing a meek, half-hearted Iranian retaliatory missile strike against the American Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar (All missiles were intercepted with Qatar’s assistance) to announcing a ceasefire in the war between Israel and Iran.
Then, mere hours after Iran violated the ceasefire and Israel was preparing to retaliate, Trump excoriated Israel and, to a lesser extent, Iran, in an expletive-ridden rant. So what accounts for this seeming pendulum swing in his foreign policy?
By all accounts, except of course for those coming from the Iranian regime, Israel had Iran on the ropes and the Ayatollah’s hold on power was teetering. Yes, Iran had done damage to the Israeli home front against which more than 500 ballistic missiles and more than 1,000 drones were launched, almost entirely at civilian targets.
But Israel had decapitated the senior leadership of the Iranian military and IRGC, assassinated all of the top Iranian nuclear scientists, established air superiority over much of the country, including Tehran, destroyed ballistic-missile stores, annihilated approximately 250 ballistic missile launchers and badly damaged the nuclear sites in Natanz and Isfahan.
And all of this had happened before June 21, 2025, when approximately 125 American military aircraft, including 7 B-2 Stealth Bombers out of Whiteman AFB (Missouri), and 75 submarine-launched precision-guided cruise missiles were unleashed on three of Iran’s nuclear facilities: Natanz, Isfahan and Fordow. They were “totally obliterated,” according to Trump.
Immediately following the airstrikes, Trump made a televised address during which he claimed that subsequent attacks would be “far greater” unless Iran agreed to a deal. Remember, this is the same Trump who, for decades, has adamantly reiterated his conviction that Iran cannot, ever, get a nuclear weapon.
Yet after one, albeit significant, but not entirely decisive strike, Trump changed his tune to allow for this ceasefire. When Iran was on the brink of collapse, when he had the chance to hammer the final nail into the coffin of Iran’s nuclear program, why did Mr. Trump pull back? Why did he prevent Israel from achieving total victory and potentially laying the groundwork for regime change? Why did he pivot back to diplomacy?
The answer is three-fold.
To begin, we need to look at the timing. Intelligence reports have claimed that in the days leading up to America’s strikes against Iran, Netanyahu convinced President Trump and his advisors that while America’s GBU-57 Massive Ordinance Penetrator, commonly known as the “bunker buster,” was the preferred tool to destroy the Fordow site, the Israelis had an alternative plan and were prepared to go it alone if the United States did not get involved.
Yet Trump chose a “let’s see what happens” approach during the first days of the war, maintaining ambiguity as to whether he would get involved or not. This coyness was in part a ruse and in part a hedge. Trump was waiting to see how the Israelis fared and how much of the “heavy lifting” they were able to do before committing American assets to the conflict.
This makes sense. If American lives and assets can be protected or their involvement avoided because an ally has done all the work, then great. A win-win for America. But there was a window that was rapidly closing that I believe contributed to Trump’s decision to attack and his decision to impose a ceasefire.
That window was the lead-up to the NATO conference at the Hague. Trump desperately wanted, even needed, to arrive at the conference as the reigning “peacemaker in chief.” Trump knew that arriving at the conference, having just successfully imposed a ceasefire on Israel and Iran, would place him in an ideal position to extract concessions from our European partners when it comes to defense spending and the war between Ukraine and Russia. So, the first reason for the sharp turn in policy was with this in mind.
Another consideration driving this pendulum swing relates to the role that Qatar has played in the region and the recent coziness between the Qataris and the Trump administration.
Qatar has a long history of supporting Islamic terrorist organizations and actions in the region. Think about its financial and material support for Hamas (an Iranian proxy) and the haven it provided to Hamas’s senior leadership. It has an equally concerning history of funneling money into U.S. institutions of higher learning to gain ideological influence over American college students.
The effects of this initiative have been best displayed by the glut of anti-Israel, anti-Jewish protests on college campuses nationwide. These have been largely fueled directly or indirectly by Qatari money. Qatar also happens to host the largest and one of the most strategically important American military installations in the region: the Al Udeid Air Base.
So the relationship with Qatar is complicated, to say the least. They take very clear actions against us, they clearly hate our Western, democratic values, but we also need them, and vice versa. Don’t forget that just last month, Trump visited the region and signed a massive $1.2 trillion economic exchange with Qatar.
This included, among other things, a $1 billion deal with Raytheon to acquire anti-drone capabilities, a $2 billion deal with General Atomics to acquire the MQ-9 UAV, and a $38 billion statement of intent to further strengthen the U.S.-Qatari security partnership in maritime security and air defense capabilities. Keep in mind, these are just some of the defense-oriented components of the agreement and do not include any of the civilian components.
Needless to say, it is in the best interest of the United States to keep the Qataris happy so that these deals go through. One of Trump’s campaign promises was to bring back American manufacturing and to bring foreign investment that would stimulate the economy.
This deal does it all. So, it should come as no surprise that the Qataris played a pivotal role in pushing for and helping to bring about this ceasefire. I suggest that, either implicitly or explicitly, in a classic case of economic extortion, the Qataris let it be known that the “economic exchange” deal hinged upon Trump’s backing for a ceasefire that would allow the Iranian regime, ideological allies of the Qataris, to live on and fight another day.
Finally, Israel has been engaged in a war for its survival since the War of Independence in 1948. Each conflict Israel has fought (1956, 1967, 1973, 1982, First and Second Intifadas, Gaza 2008, Gaza 2012, Gaza 2014, Gaza 2021, Gaza 2023, and the campaign against Iran) is a mere continuation of the original attempt to annihilate Israel.
While Israel has never initiated these conflicts, they have also never been defeated. Unfortunately, Israel has never been allowed the chance to achieve total victory over their enemies, as each time a ceasefire has been imposed upon it by the international community. By restraining Israel from decisively defeating its enemies, the international community has tacitly or intentionally permitted Israel’s enemies to survive to fight another day.
This imposed ceasefire by Trump is yet one more example of this abject refusal to allow Israel to assert military dominance and establish lasting deterrence. As supportive of Israel as Trump is, has been, and hopefully continues to be, he has succumbed to the principle of not allowing Israel the time and space to end this generational war once and for all.
I believe that this is a mistake and one that will ultimately come back to harm Israel and the United States.