Courtesy of JTA. Photo credit: Amos Ben-Gershom, Israel Government Press Office
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shares with former President Donald Trump his autobiography at Trump’s estate, Mar-a-Lago, Palm Beach, Florida, July 26, 2024
(JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered enthusiastic congratulations to President-elect Donald Trump, saying his victory heralds a “powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America.”
“Dear Donald and Melania Trump, Congratulations on history’s greatest comeback!” Netanyahu said early Wednesday in a message to the once and future president.
Netanyahu is no stranger to comebacks. In 1996, an upset win that took all night to decide elevated him to the prime ministership; he lost decisively three years later, but then returned to politics and to Israel’s highest office in 2009, remaining prime minister until 2021, when he was ousted in another close race. His latest reelection was in late 2022.
For Netanyahu, Trump’s election also offers a fresh start with the White House. He has tussled in recent months with the Biden administration over how Israel is conducting its multi-front war, and on Tuesday fired his defense minister, who was close to the Biden administration. He suggested in his statement that good times were ahead under Trump.
“Your historic return to the White House offers a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America,” he said. “This is a huge victory!”
Netanyahu’s office put out the statement just before 3 a.m. Eastern time, when Trump’s win seemed all but inevitable — but almost three hours before the major outlets called it definitively.
His alacrity was not surprising: Trump took years to forgive him for congratulating Joe Biden for his 2020 win. At that time, Netanyahu’s congratulations were delayed — coming 12 hours after the race was called and after other world leaders had offered their congratulations. But nonetheless Trump, who has never accepted the results of the 2020 election, bristled at Netanyahu, later using an expletive to describe him and falsely claiming the Israeli leader was first to congratulate Biden.
Trump and Netanyahu made up over this past summer, when Netanyahu and his wife Sara visited the Trumps at their Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. Netanyahu signed his note to Trump, “In true friendship, yours, Benjamin and Sara Netanyahu.”
Netanyahu has brushed off claims that he and Trump, whom he has said was the best ever U.S. president for Israel, were ever truly on the outs. When they were last both in office, from 2017 to 2021, Trump made far-reaching changes to U.S. policy regarding Israel that fulfilled many of Netanyahu’s wishes, including moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights and parts of the West Bank, defunding Palestinian agencies, pulling out of the Iran nuclear agreement and brokering normalization deals between Israel and four Arab countries.
During the campaign, Trump has pitched himself as a staunch defender of Israel, and has said it should have a freer hand in battling its enemies, but has also called for the Israel-Hamas war to be over, and the Israeli hostages held by the terror group in Gaza to be released, by time he takes office in January.
Netanyahu’s ministers openly celebrated Trump’s victory. Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli shared a post on social media that said, “Hamas, Hezbollah, and all terrorists globally. You’re f—ed.” Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir posted, “Yesssss.” Transit Minister Miri Regev wrote, “The world needs a strong leader for the world’s largest power — the U.S. America’s citizens chose correctly.”
