Reports and speculations have continued to swirl about a possible rift between President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The rumors come amid aggressive efforts by Trump and members of his administration to hammer out peace agreements or ceasefires with Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, and also with Yemeni Islamist political and military Houthi rebels.

However, Trump's Special Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff told Breitbart News in an exclusive interview filmed at the White House last week that speculation about a falling-out between the two leaders is “preposterous.”

I’ll tell you, first of all, it sounds like we have a very similar thought process that half these reports we discount so maybe we should discount more than half. I think this report is going to be deadly accurate here, but Prime Minister Netanyahu and the Israeli people are a staunch ally of the United States and it goes back the other way. 

I’ve been at multiple meetings with the president and the Prime Minister—they’re friendly. They’re good friends in fact. That doesn’t mean they agree on absolutely everything and I think that’s the tendency, right? You have a newspaper person who hears about a small disagreement about something that normal human beings like me and you would pay no attention to, but that particular newspaper reporter then conflates that into some large article about some massive issues that they have? It’s preposterous. 

Israel is a great partner for the United States, strategically, economically, we think very much alike, we have very similar objectives. They don’t want to see a weaponized nuclear state in the state of Iran. And so, I don’t think there’s much daylight between how they think and how we think from a foreign policy perspective.

But as I reported on May 8, after four years of former President Joe Biden throwing Netanyahu and the Jewish state under the bus at every opportunity in deference to Gazan Palestinians as the Israel-Hamas war raged on, Netanyahu was likely beyond relieved after Trump won the 2024 presidential election.  

Now, less than four months after Trump's inauguration, Netanyahu declared last Wednesday that "Israel will defend itself by itself" after Trump on Tuesday announced that the U.S. had reached a ceasefire deal between Yemen's Houthis that doesn't include Israel, which is also at war with the Houthis. 

Netanyahu said in a short video to the Israeli people at the time:

First of all, we are dealing with it, and the rule that I have set is: Israel will defend itself by itself. We are doing this in Yemen, we are doing this in other places, and the distances are very great. Israel has a long arm, and we will deploy it. If others join us, our American friends – all the better. If they don't join – we will defend ourselves by ourselves.

READ MORE: Netanyahu Says 'Israel Will Defend Itself by Itself' After Trump Announcement of Ceasefire With Houthis

Watch: Ballistic Missile Hits Near Ben Gurion Airport in Israel, Major Escalation Expected

Despite denying a rift exists, Wifkoff said some aspects of the administration's efforts are disappointing. 

There are some aspects of it that are disappointing to me. I wish we could have gotten the last group of hostages out. We may still get them out. I think that it’s a tense negotiation. We’re in talks every single day. We’re in talks with the Israelis, we’re talking to the Qataris, the Egyptians, the Emiratis—everybody is focused, particularly as the president’s trip is coming up, to get a better result, a peaceful result. We’re hoping that we can do that without the Israelis having to go in. There’s some talk about that but I hope it doesn’t have to happen. 

We have a deal on the table that Hamas could have taken six weeks ago. I’ve discussed this with the Israelis at length and the other stakeholders in this process. Hamas should say yes to it. It is a path to a peaceful dialogue and maybe even a peaceful, long-term, durable solution to this. But Hamas is going to have to demilitarize, and they’re going to have to quickly get to the terms we’ve set forth and we hope that they do.

Not to disagree with Mr. Witkoff, but Hamas — as is the case with Islamist Iran and the Houthi rebels — is less interested (if at all) in a permanent peace agreement with Israel, or the United States in support of Israel, than with wiping the Jewish state off the map. If anything, when any of the above do honor ceasefires for a short time, they do so to regroup, re-arm, or both. 

Moreover, it's my belief that Iran will never give up its pursuit of a viable nuclear weapon without first being bombed to smithereens, if even then.

I'd write "prove me wrong," as do more than a few social media keyboard jockeys, but the radical Islamists continue to prove with right, with regularity. 

Team Trump has been thinking outside the box, and it’s refreshing after four years of Biden malaise.

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