U.S. President Donald Trump denied claims on Tuesday that Israel forced him into taking preemptive action against Iran.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office alongside German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Trump said that he believed that Iran was going to launch a first strike during talks between Tehran and Washington.
“We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack first,” Trump said. “They were going to attack if we didn’t do it. They were going to attack first. I felt strongly about that.”
“If anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand, but Israel was ready, and we were ready,” he added.
Trump and officials in the administration have offered different accounts about the timing of the strikes on Iran and the nature of the “imminent threat” that Trump referenced when he announced major combat operations on Saturday.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told reporters at separate briefings on Monday that the strikes against Iran were necessary because Iran was rebuilding its conventional deterrent force of drones and missiles to protect its nuclear program.
“This operation needed to happen because Iran, in about a year or a year-and-a-half, would cross the line of immunity, meaning they would have so many short-range missiles, so many drones, that no one could do anything about it because they could hold the whole world hostage,” Rubio said.
Rubio also suggested that the U.S. joined airstrikes first launched by Israel because Iran would retaliate against U.S. forces and interests, regardless of whether or not the United States participated in the strikes.
“We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action,” Rubio said. “We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.”
That portion of Rubio’s remarks has prompted a furious response from Democrats, who have accused Israel of dragging America into war.
Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), who caucuses with the Democrats, called Rubio’s comment “stunning” at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Tuesday.
“Have we now delegated the most solemn decision that can be made in our society, the decision to go to war, to another country?” King asked. “That’s the breathtaking implication of Secretary Rubio’s statement, which, to me, is the only explanation I’ve seen as to why this action was taken when it was.”
Trump’s comments in the Oval Office on Tuesday appear to be the first time that an administration official has claimed that Iran was poised to launch a first strike against the United States and its regional partners. He did not say what led him to believe that such an attack was imminent.
The president also fielded questions from reporters about the progress of operations against Iran and about the support and lack of support from some American allies.
Trump singled out Spain and the United Kingdom as “uncooperative” and “terrible.”
“We’re going to cut off all trade with Spain,” Trump said. “We don’t want anything to do with Spain.”
“I’m not happy with the U.K., either,” Trump added, citing Britain’s delay in providing the United States with access to its military bases until after Iran launched attacks against Cyprus. “This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with.”
Merz told reporters that Germany supports the American effort to overthrow the Iranian government, which he called a “terrorist regime,” and that he and Trump would have discussions about “the day after.”
“We are on the same page in terms of getting this terrible regime in Tehran away,” Merz said. “We have to talk about the strategy, what is following after this regime? And we have to strategize on this entire region.”
