Trump calls Israeli PM a ‘war hero’, and adds ‘I am too’
US President Donald Trump has described himself as a “war hero” and praised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a “good man” and fellow “war hero” during a radio interview.
Trump, who evaded the Vietnam War draft, justified giving himself the label on The Mark Levin Show on Tuesday because of his decisions about the use of military force.
He said he was working with Netanyahu – who is under an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes – to free hostages being held by Hamas.
US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. (AP)
“[Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is] a war hero because we work together. He’s a war hero,” Trump told Levin, adding: “I guess I am too.”
“Nobody cares, but I am too,” Trump continued.
“I mean, I sent those planes,” he added, referring to US strikes on Iranian nuclear sites earlier this year.
Throughout the interview, Trump complained he had not received sufficient credit for the air strikes, or for his other attempts at easing global tensions.
Just after the interview aired, CNN host Erin Burnett played the clip to former Republican Representative and Trump critic Adam Kinzinger.
US President Donald Trump ordered stealth bombers like these against Iranian nuclear targets earlier this year. (USAF/AP)
Kinzinger, a former US Air National Guard officer, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, dismissed the president’s claims.
“I mean, look, this is just nuts. This is nuts. And they’re going to find, his people are going to find, a way to justify this.”
Trump has made it abundantly clear that his lack of military service is a sore spot for him.
He told the Washington Post in 2015 of his repeated Vietnam-era deferments: “I’ve always felt somewhat guilty because I didn’t serve like many other people.” In 2019 he cited a desire to “make up for it.”
His remarks – which recall his 2015 attack on then-Senator John McCain for not being a “war hero” because he was captured – are the latest in a long line of flippant Trump comments comparing himself to service members.
Trump told 2015 biographer Michael D’Antonio that his attendance at a military-themed boarding school meant that he “always felt that I was in the military.”
“I felt that I was in the military in the true sense because I dealt with those people,” Trump said, adding that he’d had “more training militarily than a lot of the guys that go into the military.”
In 2016, when the father of a slain US Army captain suggested Trump’s sacrifices didn’t compare to his family’s, Trump told ABC News: “I think I’ve made a lot of sacrifices. I work very, very hard.”
When pressed on whether working hard was really such a sacrifice, he doubled down.
“I think when I can employ thousands and thousands of people, take care of their education, take care of so many things,” Trump said.
“Even in the military, I mean, I was responsible along with a group of people for getting the Vietnam Memorial built in downtown Manhattan, which to this day people thank me for.”
Donald Trump Jr. made a similar case in 2019. He recalled driving through Arlington National Cemetery, seeing the many white gravestones, and having it remind him of his family’s “sacrifices” in facing political attacks and giving up millions in business.
Former US president Donald Trump was wounded on his ear during an assassination attempt on July 13. (AP)
By 2019, the elder Trump quipped about having wanted a Medal of Honor and even asking about giving himself one, before being dissuaded.
In an interview with Piers Morgan that year, he added of his lack of service, “I think I make up for that right now” by pushing for increased military funding.
And in 2020 he said while discussing McCain: “I will be a better warrior than anybody.”
Trump’s 2023 Memorial Day message on Truth Social was in a similar vein.
After wishing a happy holiday to those who made the “ultimate sacrifice,” he extended the same wishes to others who faced “a very different, but equally dangerous fire.”
Trump has returned to this theme since surviving two assassination attempts during the 2024 campaign.
In October, Trump compared the iconography of him emerging from the Pennsylvania attempt, with a bloodied ear and fist in the air, to the Iwo Jima Memorial.
“You’re not supposed to be alive for iconic,” Trump said. “But they say it’s the most … I think Iwo Jima is right there. They took a lot of bullets putting up the flag.”
