Dropping F-bomb, Trump heads to NATO summit angry with Israel and Iran

WASHINGTON — NATO leaders kicked off a summit in the Netherlands this week without President Donald Trump, with some saying they made the journey to preserve the core values of the alliance. But a fired-up American commander in chief could put that focus to the test.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Tuesday he was at the NATO summit to “reinforce Canada’s commitment to it — so we can better protect our people, our sovereignty, and our Allies.” But Carney and other alliance leaders may want to brace themselves as an angry Trump heads their way, making clear as he left the White House on Tuesday that he was upset with both Israel and Iran.

“We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f--- they’re doing,” Trump told reporters while taking questions on the South Lawn before 7 a.m. Eastern time. “Do you understand that?”

He then turned and walked to Marine One after a display of frustration with Israel that few U.S. presidents have shown before journalists and the world.

Asked if he thought Tehran had violated a ceasefire agreement he and his team had gotten both Iranian and Israeli officials to approve, Trump said, “They violated it. But Israel violated it, too.”

“Israel, as soon as we made the deal, they came out and they dropped a load of bombs, the likes of which I’d never seen before. The biggest load that we’ve seen,” Trump said. “I’m not happy with Israel.”

NATO leaders were expected to discuss the Israel-Iran conflict, especially after the United States on Saturday evening used B-2 bombers, bunker-busting bombs and Tomahawk missiles fired from a Navy submarine to hit three key Iranian nuclear facilities. Israel and Iran spent the night trading attacks after Trump contended that he had made “peace” with a ceasefire framework.

“When I say, ‘OK, now you have 12 hours,’ you don’t go out in the first hour and just drop everything you have on them. So I’m not happy with them,” Trump said of Israel. “I’m not happy with Iran, either. But I’m really unhappy if Israel’s going out this morning because of one rocket that didn’t land, that was shot perhaps by mistake, that didn’t land. I’m not happy about that.”

Among the topics related to the conflict NATO leaders were expected to cover: the state of Iran’s nuclear enrichment and research facilities, as well as military assets such as long-range missile launchers.

About the deeply buried Fordo nuclear facility in Iran that he ordered U.S. forces to hit, Trump said Tuesday morning: “Iran will never rebuild its nuclear. … From there? Absolutely not. That place is under rock. That place is demolished.”

Other Trump administration officials, including Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio — who also is Trump’s acting national security adviser — have said it could take weeks or even months to get a full intelligence assessment of Fordo and the two other facilities struck by the U.S. bombs and missiles.

Trump, feeling personally burned by Iranian and Israeli leaders, could overshadow the summit with his grievances and further demands of the two countries, especially because he has touted his long friendship and working relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., the ranking member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said recently that it was “difficult not to have some concerns” about Trump on the global stage.

“The last time he was [at a NATO summit], he essentially gave away a lot of our leverage on Ukraine by saying they’ll never be a NATO member essentially,” Reed said in an interview. “I don’t think the president is going there with the intent of strengthening our bonds with our European allies, which should be the purpose.”

“I think it, again, will be more all about him and very little about national security,” Reed added.

Two senior Democratic members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in a Monday evening statement urged Trump, once he arrives in the Netherlands, to listen to “our allies in Europe and partners in the Middle East who have extensive experience with Iran,” because they “continue to urge for restraint.”

“Now is the time for de-escalation and diplomacy,” ranking member Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire and Chris Coons of Delaware said.

‘Calm down’

Trump appeared to be in that very mindset as he left the White House.

“These guys [have] got to calm down. It’s ridiculous,” he said. “We have to have Israel calm down, because they went on a mission this morning. I got to get Israel to calm down now.”

Meanwhile, before the U.S. military hit the Iranian targets, a White House official told reporters Friday afternoon that the president had three main goals for the NATO summit.

Trump intended to press alliance leaders to increase their respective countries’ defense spending to 5% of their gross domestic products, the official said. Trump also planned to urge his colleagues to revamp their respective defense supply chains to prioritize “Western supply chains,” the official said, a seeming jab at China. And he intended to “reaffirm our strong ties” with alliance partners.

To that end, Trump appeared to have cooled down by the time he gaggled with a different group of reporters on Air Force One later Tuesday morning. Unlike during his first term, Trump sounded more ready to work with European NATO members as they try to increase their annual defense budgets.

“A lot of that money goes to rebuilding their bridges, their roads, so it can take heavy equipment. And, you know, we don’t have any roads in Europe. We don’t have any bridges in Europe. So, no, [it] wouldn’t be quite the same thing for us,” he said when asked if he would propose upping the yearly Pentagon budget to 5% of U.S. GDP.

The World Bank put U.S. defense spending in 2023, the last year for which the group released data, at 3.4% of GDP.

Analysts at the Atlantic Council think tank concluded in a recent assessment that since Russia kicked off its war with Ukraine in February 2022, “European defense spending in aggregate has trended positive.”

“European and Canadian defense spending as a share of GDP has increased from 1.66% in 2022 to 2.02% in 2024. Twenty-three NATO members now spend at least 2% of GDP on defense — nearly four times the number (six) that did in 2021,” the council wrote. “Ahead of The Hague Summit, fewer than one-third of allies have pledged to spend at least 3.5% of GDP on defense. Only Poland is currently at that level.”

Still, Trump 2.0 had a different tone about his alliance counterparts as he spoke Tuesday on Air Force One: “I’m committed to being their friends. You know, I’ve become friends with many of those leaders, and I’m committed to helping them.”