US Vice President JD Vance has delivered a blunt and revealing message to Israel’s far-right cabinet members: stop attacking Donald Trump, because he is the last powerful leader on earth still willing to stand by you.
Speaking from the White House podium yesterday, the day after Trump signed a memorandum of understanding to end the US-Israeli war with Iran, Vance turned his fire on Israeli ministers who had publicly criticised the deal.
VIDEO: Vice president Vance in a message to to Israeli cabinet members:
“If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have left
2/3 of the defensive weapons that have protected your homeland have been built by… https://t.co/asCV1nwUNr pic.twitter.com/DNA42AdgNp
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) June 18, 2026
“Donald J Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time,” Vance told reporters. “And he happens to be the head of state of the world’s superpower. If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have anywhere left in the entire world.”
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Vance directed his remarks specifically at far-right ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, who had publicly attacked Trump’s Iran deal in terms the vice president described as “very personally” offensive to the US president. He pointedly noted that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had not gone “down this path” of direct personal attacks, though Netanyahu’s own position is said to be one of resignation.
Vance delivered a pointed reminder of Israel’s material dependence on Washington. “Over the last three months, two-thirds of the defensive weapons that have protected your homeland have been built by American hands and paid for by American tax dollars,” he said. “The problem for Israel is not Donald J Trump. And anybody in Israel who thinks their biggest problem is the President of the United States needs to wake up and smell the reality of the situation that country is in.”
Vance’s criticism of Israel’s approach extended beyond the White House podium. In a separate interview with The New York Times published the same day, he questioned Israel’s fundamental security strategy in terms that many say would have been unthinkable from a senior US official even two years ago.
“What is your exact proposal?” Vance asked, addressing the Israeli ministers who had opposed the Iran deal. “You’re a country of nine million people. You can’t just kill your way out of solving every single national security problem that you have.”
READ: The U.S.-Iran deal: What has changed and what does this mean for the region?
The vice president’s remarks echoed those of Trump himself at the G7 summit in France, where the US president called for restraint in Israel’s ongoing war with Hezbollah. “Too many people have been killed,” Trump said. “You don’t have to knock down an apartment house every time you’re looking for somebody, because there are a lot of people in those apartment houses, and they’re not all Hezbollah.”
The memorandum of understanding signed by Trump and Iranian President Pezeshkian opens the Strait of Hormuz to international shipping, lifts the US naval blockade of Iranian ports, and commits all parties to ending fighting on every front, including Lebanon. It includes immediate sanctions waivers on Iran’s fossil fuel industry and pledges a $300bn international reconstruction fund for Tehran.
Key exclusions in the deal have raised eyebrows indicating to what many say is an Iranian victory and a humiliating US and Israel defeat. There is no binding resolution on Iran’s ballistic weapons programme, no concrete limits on its support for regional proxy forces, and only a commitment to dilute Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium “on site”, with the future of Iran’s nuclear programme left to 60 days of negotiations.
READ: Trump turns on Israel over Lebanon war, says Syria could fight Hezbollah better
