In a candid and confident press conference on Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that Israel had acted entirely alone in striking Iran’s South Pars gas compound while also declaring that the war was closer to its end than most people realized. He announced Iran had lost all uranium enrichment and ballistic missile capabilities after twenty days of conflict. Netanyahu rejected the idea that Israel had dragged the US into the war, framing the alliance as one of shared conviction and mutual alignment.
Netanyahu spoke warmly about his partnership with Trump, describing it as the most closely coordinated relationship between two world leaders he had witnessed. He presented Trump as a fully independent decision-maker who had arrived at the conflict with a sophisticated and self-formed understanding of Iran’s nuclear threat. Netanyahu revealed that Trump had briefed him on certain aspects of that threat rather than receiving a standard Israeli intelligence presentation.
The prime minister confirmed Israel’s independent strike on South Pars and noted Trump’s personal request to pause further attacks on Iranian gas infrastructure. He treated both facts with diplomatic transparency, presenting them as natural elements of an extraordinary alliance. Netanyahu was consistent throughout in insisting that Israel’s military decisions were its own to make.
Netanyahu dismissed Iran’s Hormuz threats as blackmail that would fail. He proposed building overland pipelines from the Arabian Peninsula to Israeli and Mediterranean ports, arguing this infrastructure would permanently remove the Hormuz chokepoint as an Iranian strategic weapon. Netanyahu framed the proposal as part of a broader post-conflict regional transformation.
Netanyahu closed by discussing Iran’s leadership confusion. He noted Mojtaba had not appeared publicly and said he was genuinely unsure who was governing Iran. Netanyahu observed fierce competition among rival factions in Tehran and concluded that this internal chaos, combined with military losses, made the war’s conclusion closer than most people expected.
