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This is an adapted excerpt from the March 8 episode of "Ayman."
In some surprising news, Donald Trump did something right last week — in fact, not just once, but twice. First, he sent a letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, saying that he wants to peacefully reach a deal on Iran’s nuclear program.
“Well, there are two ways Iran can be handled, militarily or you make a deal. I would prefer to make a deal,” Trump told Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo. “I hope that Iran, and I’ve written them a letter, saying I hope you’re going to negotiate because if we have to go in militarily, it’s going to be a terrible thing for them.”
At the time, Obama was strongly criticized for talking to Iran, with some viewing it as a sign of weakness, arguing he was “caving” to terrorists.
Trump won’t like this comparison, but the last American president who kicked off his administration’s Middle Eastern diplomacy by sending a personal letter to Iran’s supreme leader was Barack Obama in 2009. That letter began a yearslong correspondence that led to the thawing of U.S.-Iran tensions and then to one of the biggest American foreign policy wins in decades: the Iran nuclear deal.
At the time, Obama was strongly criticized for talking to Iran, with some viewing it as a sign of weakness, arguing he was “caving” to terrorists. These attacks came from the usual suspects like Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham and John McCain, but also from some Democrats.
But Obama turned out to be right. In a statement posted to X on Saturday, Khamenei rejected Trump’s call for talks. “Some coercive governments insist on negotiations,” the Iranian leader wrote. “Such negotiations aren’t aimed at solving issues. Their aim is to exert their dominance and impose what they want.” But Trump's openness to speaking with Iran shows the president knows, like Obama did before him, that talking to adversaries is not a sign of American weakness. It’s a sign of American strength and prudence.
That brings me to the other item Trump got right last week. On Wednesday, Axios’ Barak Ravid reported that, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the discussions, Trump’s administration has been negotiating directly with Hamas, both over the release of U.S. hostages still held in the Gaza Strip and on the possibility of a broader deal.
This news did not go over well with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. Netanyahu’s top aide, Ron Dermer, reportedly erupted in a call with Trump’s hostage envoy Adam Boehler, objecting to the talks and to making proposals “without Israel’s consent,” an Israeli official and a source with knowledge of the call told Axios. This exchange followed a report from Israeli news outlet Ynet, citing several U.S. sources, that Israel leaked information about America’s direct talks with Hamas with the intent of sabotaging the discussions.
Think about that for a moment. You have the Israeli government, which is reliant on American weapons and diplomatic support, telling America not to make proposals to Hamas, a group holding American hostages, without Israel’s consent. Who’s the superpower here again?
American presidents shouldn’t be afraid to talk to adversaries.
The fact that the Trump administration now sees the Netanyahu government as sabotaging its ceasefire and hostage release talks is also important. It seemed like every week we saw reports that Joe Biden’s administration was “frustrated” with Netanyahu for sabotaging talks, only to follow that up by sending him more weapons and vetoing more ceasefire resolutions from the United Nations.
Now, we have no idea how this will end up on either front, the Iranian nuclear talks or the Hamas talks. The only thing we know is that Trump is erratic. Case in point: how the president responded to the leaked story about his administration's talks with Hamas, threatening on social media to have members of Hamas and Palestinians in Gaza killed if hostages are not immediately released. And, of course, it was Trump himself who ripped up Obama’s Iran nuclear deal in his first term.
But American presidents shouldn’t be afraid to talk to adversaries. Nor should they be pushed around by Netanyahu and Dermer. We saw how that ended for the last president. Now we’ll see if Trump follows in Biden’s footsteps.