Netanyahu says Iran ‘wants to kill’ Trump, was behind assassination attempts

Trying to justify Israel’s actions against Iran, Netanyahu said those who “chant ‘death to America’, tried to assassinate President Trump twice, killed 241 of your Marines in Beirut, killed and injured thousands of American soldiers in Afghanistan” shouldn’t have nuclear weapons.

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Asked whether he had any intel that the assassination attempts on Trump were directly from Iran, Netanyahu said, “Through proxies, yes, through their intel, yes, they want to kill him”.

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‘Enemy number one’

Assassination attempts were made on Trump twice last year while he was campaigning for the Presidential elections.

Netanyahu added that Iran views Trump as their “enemy number one” and wants to kill him.

“They want to kill him. He’s enemy number one,” Fox News quoted him as saying.

“He’s a decisive leader. He never took the path that others took to try to bargain with them in a way that is weak, giving them basically a pathway to enrich uranium, which means a pathway to the bomb, padding it with billions and billions of dollars,” Netanyahu told Fox News.

Netanyahu added that Trump has been assertive and clear about how he doesn’t want Iran to have a nuclear weapon, making him Iran’s ‘enemy number one’.

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“He took up this fake agreement and basically tore it up. He killed Qasem Soleimani. He made it very clear, including now, ‘You cannot have a nuclear weapon, which means you cannot enrich uranium.’ He’s been very forceful, so for them, he’s enemy number one,” Netanyahu said.

Adding that Iran also tried to kill him, Netanyahu called himself Trump’s “junior partner”.

Israel attacked Iran’s military and nuclear sites in their surprise overnight strikes on Friday, which triggered the ongoing conflict. During those strikes, Israel killed Iran’s several key military commanders and nuclear scientists working on its nuclear programs.

Netanyahu said that Israel is facing an “imminent” and “dual existential threat”.

“One, the threat of Iran rushing to weaponise their enriched uranium to make atomic bombs with a specific and declared intent to destroy us. Second, a rush to increase their ballistic missile arsenal to the capacity that they would have 3,600 weapons a year,” said Netanyahu, adding that Israel had to act because no country can withstand the missile and nuclear power Iran was trying to attain.