Hours before President Donald Trump issued a strong endorsement of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, opposition leader Yair Lapid predicted that Americans wouldn’t intervene in Israel’s election. In an interview with Amit Segal on Channel 12’s “Meet the Press,” Lapid said he’d even reached out to the Americans himself to ask them to stay out of it. “I don’t think they’re going to intervene,” he said—only to have Trump’s statement arrive hours later.
Lapid’s Awkward Timing: The opposition leader addressed the possibility of Trump intervening in Israel’s election during Saturday night’s interview with Segal on Channel 12 News, estimating it wouldn’t happen. But just hours later, the president expressed strong support for Netanyahu, contradicting Lapid’s assessment.
During the interview, Lapid was asked whether he saw any possibility that the U.S. president would try to intervene in Israel’s election campaign. “I think that would be very wrong. I also spoke about this with the Americans,” Lapid replied. When Segal asked whether the Americans had raised the possibility, Lapid clarified that the conversation was his initiative: “No, I spoke on my own initiative.”
Lapid went on to detail the message he conveyed to the Americans: “We’re asking—not even for my benefit, I’m not worried—but we’re asking not to intervene in the State of Israel’s election. We’re a democracy. I don’t think an Israeli prime minister should intervene in American elections, I don’t think an American president should intervene in Israeli elections.”
Lapid added that the election is an internal matter for the Israeli public: “That’s the power of democracy, that it’s a question between Israelis and themselves.” But then came the assessment that proved particularly problematic given the developments that arrived hours later. “Right now it doesn’t look like it, since President Trump said yesterday on television that he doesn’t… they asked him if he trusts Netanyahu, and he said: ‘I don’t trust anyone.’ So I don’t think they’re going to intervene,” Lapid said.
As noted, just hours after these remarks, Trump published a message of support for Netanyahu, creating a stark gap between the opposition leader’s assessment and the American president’s actual conduct.