After a muted meeting with Trump, Netanyahu turns his ire on Zohran Mamdani

Benjamin Netanyahu slipped into the White House through a side entrance on Tuesday.

There was no flashy televised greeting outside the West Wing, no Oval Office appearance before reporters, nor a joint news conference afterwards. For two leaders who have turned political theatre into an art form, the meeting unfolded with strikingly little spectacle.

Instead, a handful of official photographs emerged after the Israeli prime minister and President Donald Trump concluded their first face-to-face talks since the United States joined Israel's war against Iran earlier this year.

Israeli media suggested the unusually restrained choreography reflected a shared desire to avoid reinforcing the perception that Netanyahu was steering Trump towards another military confrontation with Iran, even as the US president weighs whether diplomacy with Tehran has run its course.

Hours later, Netanyahu was back in front of the cameras.

Appearing on Fox News, he turned his attention to New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, reviving a dispute that has become increasingly intertwined with the Israeli leader's efforts to frame international criticism of his government.

Netanyahu confirmed he would travel to New York for the UN General Assembly in September despite Mamdani's staunch push for enforcing the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant against him over war crimes in Gaza.

Calling Mamdani a "hate-spewing elected official", Netanyahu accused the mayor of turning New Yorkers against the city's Jewish community.

"What are we, in the 1930s?" he asked sarcastically.

Mamdani, speaking before Netanyahu's interview aired, had declined to engage in a "back-and-forth" with the Israeli leader, saying his priority remained protecting Jewish New Yorkers and combating hate crimes.

Carefully managed optics

The carefully controlled White House meeting came at an awkward moment for both leaders.

Trump has publicly bristled at suggestions that Netanyahu was dictating American policy on Iran. In recent days, he rejected Israeli criticism of a possible sale of F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, remarking that "nobody tells me what we should be selling", and dismissed reports that he needed Netanyahu to brief him on alleged Iranian activity at the underground Pickaxe Mountain nuclear facility.

Meanwhile, for Netanyahu, the visit carried political significance beyond the run-of-the-mill diplomacy.

With Israeli elections due in October, the prime minister has long portrayed his close relationship with successive US presidents as evidence that no rival could better safeguard Israel's strategic interests.

Before Tuesday's meeting, Israel's Channel 12 reported that Netanyahu's influence inside the Trump administration had been "greatly reduced", citing Washington's willingness to pursue a memorandum of understanding with Iran, negotiate a civilian nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia and consider supplying F-35 fighter jets to Turkey despite Israeli objections.

Haaretz similarly argued that Netanyahu arrived in Washington facing "a new reality", describing a "clear lack of mutual trust" between the two leaders after disagreements over Gaza, Iran and the failure of Netanyahu's predictions about the regional consequences of the war.

Ynet, however, noted that the visit itself remained politically valuable, allowing Netanyahu to remind Israeli voters that no foreign leader has met Trump more often during his current term.

Success claimed, questions remain

Publicly, both governments portrayed the meeting as a success, with Netanyahu describing it as "one of the best conversations" he had ever had with Trump.

The White House called the talks "positive and productive", while Trump later posted that they had held a "very good meeting" in which "many important subjects were discussed".

The lack of detail, however, fuelled further speculation.

According to Ynet, Israeli officials said several of the issues expected to dominate the talks—including Iran's alleged activity at the Pickaxe Mountain site, the possibility of renewed military action and Israel's objections to the proposed F-35 sale to Turkey—were ultimately not discussed.

Yisrael Hayom noted that Trump and Netanyahu agreed Iran remained a threat but favoured diplomacy, at least for now.