To protect the Iran peace talks, will Trump finally restrain Netanyahu? | Mohamad Bazzi

As long as Israel continues its attacks on Lebanon, any deal between the US and Iran will be at risk

On 18 June, JD Vance stood in the White House press briefing room and tore into Israeli critics of the Iran deal that his boss, Donald Trump, had signed the previous day. The vice-president argued that Trump was the only world leader who was still sympathetic to Israel after nearly three years of wars and destruction across the Middle East. If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government," Vance said, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have anywhere left in the entire world."

Vance also pointed out that, during the recent US-Israeli war on Iran, two-thirds of the defensive weapons used to protect Israel from Iranian retaliation have been built by American hands and paid for by American tax dollars". Vance publicly scolded Israel's leaders in a way they have rarely been criticized by a high-level US politician. And while Vance did not directly target his criticism at the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the subtext was clear: the Trump administration is willing to call out the Israeli leader for sabotaging ceasefire agreements so that he could prolong regional wars and maintain power.

Mohamad Bazzi is a Guardian US columnist. He is also director of the Center for Near Eastern Studies and a journalism professor at New York University