On Sunday, President Donald Trump said his administration will provide assistance to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the prime minister’s corruption trial, making the pledge during a CBS News "60 Minutes" interview. The comment was part of a broader foreign-policy discussion in which Trump criticized the Israeli judicial system’s handling of the case and addressed topics including Chinese leader Xi Jinping, tariffs and the war in Ukraine.
Netanyahu is the subject of three separate cases that include indictments alleging fraud, breach of trust and bribery. The trial has drawn sustained domestic and international attention, and Trump’s remarks add a high-profile American voice to an already contentious political and legal debate. Trump has previously called for either cancellation of the proceedings or a pardon for Netanyahu; in recent weeks he wrote on his platform Truth Social that the trial "should be cancelled, immediately, or a pardon given to a great hero," and last month urged Isaac Herzog to pardon Netanyahu at the Knesset. The CBS interview represents a continuation of those interventions by the U.S. president into Israel’s internal legal affairs.
During the televised interview, Trump framed his comments on the trial as part of a wider critique of how Israel’s judiciary has handled the case, linking his concerns to broader foreign-policy themes he raised in the program. In addition to addressing the situation involving Netanyahu, he discussed relations with China and its leader Xi Jinping, U.S. tariff policies and the ongoing war in Ukraine, using the platform to lay out a range of international priorities and grievances.
Trump’s pledge to assist Netanyahu did not include details on what form that assistance would take or how it might be delivered, and the scope of any U.S. involvement in legal matters affecting a key U.S. ally has not been specified. The president’s public interventions—through social media, statements to foreign leaders and comments in interviews—underscore a willingness to engage directly in the political and legal controversies surrounding Israel’s leadership.
The latest remarks come amid an extended period of political turbulence in Israel and heightened scrutiny of the relationship between U.S. and Israeli leaders. Trump’s calls for a pardon and his recent public entreaties to Israeli officials follow earlier interventions and add to the diplomatic pressures surrounding Netanyahu’s legal situation. How governments in Washington and Jerusalem respond to the president’s offer of assistance, and whether any concrete steps will follow, remains to be seen.
Observers will be watching for any formal requests from Israeli authorities or further clarifications from the Trump administration about the substance of the promised assistance, and for additional developments in Netanyahu’s court cases. The interplay between U.S. political support and Israel’s judicial process is likely to remain a focal point of discussion both domestically in Israel and among its international partners.