U.S. and Israel publicly disagree on attacking Iran’s energy infrastructure. Why wouldn’t Israel want the Gulf’s oil and gas to go up in flames?
Trump and Netanyahu at the White House after a joint press conference, Sept. 29, 2025. (White House /Daniel Torok)
Wednesday, March 18 and Thursday, March 19
The past two days of the aggression against Iran has exposed a significant split between the master, Israel, and its more powerful servant, the United States.
Israel would not have had its long-sought for war of expansion against Iran without the United States and specifically, without Donald Trump. Every president before Trump denied Israel, and specifically Benjamin Netanyahu.
Despite Trump commanding more fire power, Netanyahu commands something more lethal to Trump.
So when Trump tells Netanyahu not to strike Iran’s oil and gas infrastructure because Trump needs energy prices low and because he covets Iran’s untapped reserves the way he coveted Venezuela’s, what does Netanyahu do?
He bombs a huge oil depot near Tehran causing acid rain to fall on the inhabitants of Iran’s capital city. And then, despite Iranian warnings that it would retaliate against energy installations in the Gulf, Netanyahu attacks the Iranian half of a huge gas field in the Gulf Iran shares with Qatar.
This led to Trump publicly criticizing Israel. And Iran responded by attacking oil and gas infrastructure in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E. and Kuwait.
Why would Netanyahu care about what Trump says about Israel publicly, when it is what Israel can say about Trump publicly that matters?
Why would Netanyahu care about the destruction of the Gulf Arabs’ spectacular wealth when Israel’s desire since the 1982 Yinon Plan and the 30-year old, 1996 policy paper, “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm” has been to reduce surrounding Muslim lands to ruin, the better to project Israeli dominance over the entire Near East and its resources?
This is Netanyahu’s war, not Trump’s.
It is Netanyahu’s call to name Iranian targets, not Trump’s.
It is Netanyahu’s determination whether to pursue the Gaza playbook of total war on Iran and Lebanon, not Trump’s.
And if total war leads to the near destruction of Iran, Lebanon and Israel, it will be the one possessor of the ultimate weapon in the region who will determine whether or not to use it.
Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former U.N. correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, and other newspapers, including The Montreal Gazette, the London Daily Mail and The Star of Johannesburg. He was an investigative reporter for the Sunday Times of London, a financial reporter for Bloomberg News and began his professional work as a 19-year old stringer for The New York Times. He is the author of two books, A Political Odyssey, with Sen. Mike Gravel, foreword by Daniel Ellsberg; and How I Lost By Hillary Clinton, foreword by Julian Assange.
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