JERUSALEM/WASHINGTON — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has long portrayed himself to the Israeli public as being uniquely adept in dealing with Donald Trump, capable of winning and sustaining the US president’s backing.

But an acrimonious phone call this week in which the president called the prime minister “fucking crazy,” first leaked to the media and later publicly confirmed by Trump himself, laid bare the strains that have at times emerged between the two leaders.

Israeli officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged the call was among the most heated the premier has had with Trump. One of the officials said the leak had damaged Netanyahu politically ahead of this year’s Knesset election.

The US website Axios broke news of the call on Monday, saying Trump had angrily confronted Netanyahu over Israeli threats to resume airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs. “Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this,” Trump was quoted as saying.

The US president told Netanyahu not to target Beirut after Iran had warned that Israeli strikes in Lebanon were undermining talks to end the war, which began with joint US-Israeli attacks and is unpopular among Americans.

A senior Israeli official told Reuters that Netanyahu had made clear to Trump that any pause in Israeli plans to strike Beirut would only work if the Hezbollah terror group stopped hitting northern Israel. Trump was receptive to this position, the official said.

Following their call, Trump said Israel and Hezbollah had agreed to stop shooting at each other, prompting accusations by Netanyahu’s political opponents, and some within his own government, that he had ceded Israel’s sovereignty to the US.

“A total protectorate,” said Opposition Leader Yair Lapid, suggesting Netanyahu had put Israel in the position of an American client state.

Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, has repeatedly clashed with American administrations, primarily Democratic ones. Yet, Israel has remained Washington’s closest Middle East ally.

Nimrod Goren, the president of Mitvim, an Israeli think tank, said “the differences are now very public,” unlike in the past when they were usually quietly managed behind closed doors.

Trump told the New York Post on Wednesday that he was “a little bit perturbed” by Netanyahu constantly attacking Lebanon, but added: “We’ve worked very well together.”

Trump’s decision to join Israel in striking Iran, not once but twice in the space of........

© The Times of Israel