Netanyahu's 60 Minutes Interview: What It Means for US Iran Policy

The ceasefire between the United States and Iran was tested again just this week by suspected Iranian drone strikes in the Persian Gulf — the latest flare-up in a war that has now spread from the Gulf to Lebanon and is complicating White House efforts to broker a deal that would reopen the Strait of Hormuz and stabilize global energy prices. Eleven weeks into the conflict, CBS News chief Washington correspondent Major Garrett sat down with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for his first US broadcast interview since the war began.

For a site tracking American politics rather than Israeli domestic politics, the interview matters less for what it says about Jerusalem than for what it signals about Washington. Netanyahu spoke directly about his private conversations with President Trump, about the degree of US military coordination still required to finish the mission against Iran, about Chinese support for the Iranian regime, and — most strikingly for Congress — about his own proposal to end US financial support for Israel's military entirely. He also addressed, unusually candidly, why American public opinion on Israel has shifted so fast. Here is what he actually said, and what it could mean heading into a midterm year where foreign aid, Iran policy, and the Gaza war are all live fault lines inside both parties.

Asked directly whether the war with Iran is over, Netanyahu said no: "I think it'll accomplish a great deal, but it's not over because there's still nuclear material, enriched uranium, that has to be taken out of Iran," along with enrichment sites still to be dismantled, missile production Iran still wants to pursue, and proxy groups Iran still supports. On how that uranium gets removed, he was carefully evasive about method, but confirmed Trump's own appetite for a hands-on approach: "What President Trump has said to me [is], 'I want to go in there.' ... If you have an agreement, and you go in and you take it out, why not? That's the best way." Pressed on whether it could be done by force absent an agreement, Netanyahu declined to answer, saying only that he would not discuss "military means" or timetables.

Hours before sitting down with Garrett, Israel had struck Hezbollah targets in Lebanon — a front Netanyahu described as "much more Israel's than America's." Asked point-blank whether Israel would keep fighting Hezbollah even if the Iran war ends, and even if Trump personally asked him to stop, Netanyahu answered flatly: "No." He argued that ending the fight with Hezbollah prematurely would let the group "continue to torture Lebanon, continue to hold its people hostage." He was more optimistic, however, about the knock-on effects of a weakened Iranian regime, predicting that if Tehran's government is toppled or sufficiently weakened, "it's the end of Hezbollah. It's the end of Hamas. It's probably the end of the Houthis," since the entire proxy network depends on Iranian backing.

Netanyahu also pushed back on a New York Times report describing a February 11th situation-room meeting in which he allegedly oversold the certainty of Iranian regime change and the safety of the Strait of Hormuz to Trump. "That's actually incorrect," he said, insisting he had flagged both "uncertainty and risk" at the time, telling the room that "there's danger in action ... but there's greater danger in not taking action." On whether the Hormuz risk was underestimated at the outset, he was more equivocal: "It became understood" only as the fighting progressed, he said, adding, "I don't claim perfect foresight, and nobody had perfect foresight. Neither did the Iranians."

With a Trump-Xi Jinping summit looming and China remaining the world's largest importer of crude oil through the Strait of Hormuz, Garrett asked Netanyahu directly about Chinese military support for Iran. Netanyahu confirmed it: "China gave a certain amount of support, particular components of missile manufacturing," though he declined to elaborate further, saying only, "I also have a closed mouth when necessary."

The most consequential news for US policy, though, came on foreign aid. American military assistance to Israel — currently $3.8 billion per year — has enjoyed bipartisan support for decades but faces growing scrutiny amid shifting public attitudes. Asked if it is time to reset that financial relationship, Netanyahu did not hedge: "Absolutely. And I've said this to President Trump. I've said it to our own people. Their jaws dropped." He said he wants to "draw down to zero the American financial support" for Israel's military over roughly a decade, and that he wants to begin immediately: "I don't want to wait for the next Congress." It is an unusual position for an Israeli prime minister to state on American television, and one that, if pursued, would reopen one of the most durable bipartisan spending lines in US foreign policy.

Netanyahu is clearly aware of how fast US opinion has moved against Israel. A recent Pew survey found 60% of US adults hold an unfavorable view of Israel, up nearly 20 points in four years, a shift driven in large part by the war in Gaza, where the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry reports more than 70,000 people killed, including civilians as well as Hamas fighters. Netanyahu attributed most of the reputational damage not to Israeli conduct but to what he called "the eighth front of the war": social media manipulation by hostile states. "You can penetrate this little instrument," he told Garrett, "and you can say about Major Garrett anything you want, and I can paint you as a monster. And if I say it often enough, enough people will believe it."

Pressed on whether Israel bears any responsibility for the negative shift, separate from propaganda, Netanyahu allowed only that "in war, armies sometimes miss and civilians die. These are mistakes. These are not deliberate things." The International Criminal Court, which neither Israel nor the US recognizes, has accused Netanyahu of war crimes over Israel's conduct in Gaza. He also acknowledged that one of his central war aims — disarming Hamas — is not yet achieved: "Somebody has to disarm them ... if it comes down to us, then we'll have to do it, but we'll choose the time and the circumstances."

For a US audience, the most consequential lines in this interview are not about Israeli strategy but about American choices. Netanyahu's confirmation that China is materially supporting Iran's missile program lands directly in the middle of the Trump-Xi summit and gives China hawks in Congress a concrete new data point. His refusal to guarantee that fighting with Hezbollah ends even if the president asks him to stop is a preview of exactly the kind of friction that could resurface in Congress if US forces remain entangled in the region through the midterms — a live question for Trump's foreign policy record as it factors into his approval numbers.

But the aid proposal may be the most politically volatile thread of all. A sitting Israeli prime minister publicly proposing to zero out US military assistance scrambles the usual alignment on Capitol Hill, where support for Israel aid has historically split less along party lines than along an emerging generational and ideological divide inside each party — progressive Democrats and populist-right Republicans both increasingly skeptical of foreign military spending, against traditional hawks in both parties who see the aid as strategically indispensable. If Netanyahu follows through on starting the drawdown "now" rather than waiting for the next Congress, expect it to become a genuine 2026 campaign issue, forcing candidates in both parties to state a position on foreign aid and Middle East policy that many would otherwise prefer to avoid.