Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed Iran’s threats to seal the Strait of Hormuz as empty blackmail on Friday, while simultaneously announcing that Tehran’s capacity to enrich uranium and build ballistic missiles had been eliminated after twenty days of conflict. He denied Israeli responsibility for drawing the US into the war, framing such reports as manufactured misinformation. Netanyahu’s press conference conveyed a sense of strategic dominance and impending victory.
The prime minister’s comments on his partnership with Donald Trump were among the more notable moments of the briefing. He described the US-Israel relationship as uniquely coordinated, while emphasizing Trump’s full autonomy in joining the fight against Iran. Netanyahu said Trump had actually explained the Iranian nuclear threat to him, not the reverse, pointing to the American leader’s deep independent understanding of Tehran’s intentions.
Netanyahu confirmed that Israel conducted the strike on South Pars independently, a significant military action against one of Iran’s key energy installations. He also shared that Trump asked him to hold off on further strikes against Iranian gas facilities, presenting this as a natural exchange between allied leaders. Netanyahu made clear that while Israel listened to its partners, its operational independence remained a core principle.
The Israeli leader was blunt in dismissing Iran’s Hormuz threats. He proposed instead that the world invest in building pipeline infrastructure from the Arabian Peninsula to Israeli and Mediterranean ports, offering a lasting solution to the Hormuz bottleneck. Netanyahu framed this vision as both a defensive necessity and a geopolitical opportunity.
Netanyahu described Iran’s post-war leadership structure as fractured and uncertain. He noted publicly that he did not know who was running Iran, given that Mojtaba had not been seen publicly since fighting began. This leadership vacuum, combined with the military losses Iran had sustained, led Netanyahu to predict the war’s end would come faster than most people anticipated.