3 US Presidents Rejected Netanyahu War Plan, Trump Agreed: Ex-Top Official

Former Secretary of State John Kerry said that the previous US presidents did not agree to go to war with Iran because they had not "exhausted all the remedies of peaceful process".

22 Apr 2026, 17:36 · NDTV

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Israeli PM Netanyahu urged former Presidents Obama, Bush, Biden to go to war with Iran, but all three declined
John Kerry said previous presidents rejected war as peaceful solutions were not exhausted
New York Times reported Netanyahu persuaded Trump to consider joint US-Israeli action against Iran

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had proposed a war with Iran to former US presidents too, but all of them declined, said former Secretary of State John Kerry.

Speaking as a guest on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, Kerry said, "Obama said no. Bush said no. President Biden said no. I mean, I was part of those conversations."

The former US official said that the previous US presidents did not agree to go to war with Iran because they had not "exhausted all the remedies of peaceful process".

He argued that both the Vietnam and Iraq wars share a common lesson, one he knows firsthand as a Vietnam veteran is to not deceive the American public.

"And speaking as a veteran of the Vietnam War, where decisions like that were so critical, we were lied to about what that war was about, and the lesson of that war and of Iraq is don't lie to the American people and then ask them to send their sons and daughters to fight," he said.

Sharing this clip of Kerry, Iran's Press TV wrote, "Former US Secretary of State John Kerry says that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu had proposed the war on Iran to Presidents Obama, Bush, and Biden, but they all refused. The prediction was regime change, that people would rise up, but we saw that none of that happened."

Netanyahu's "Hard Sell"

A report by the New York Times detailed how Netanyahu convinced US President Donald Trump to attack Iran alongside Israel.

"In the Situation Room on Feb. 11, Mr. Netanyahu made a hard sell, suggesting that Iran was ripe for regime change and expressing the belief that a joint U.S.-Israeli mission could finally bring an end to the Islamic Republic," the report noted.

According to the report, Trump said, "Sounds good to me," and subsequently signalled a green light for the joint US-Israeli operation.

Kerry said that the presentation by Netanyahu was a "prediction" and that none of his claims of people taking over the country and regime change happened.

Vance's Tense Phone Call With Netanyahu

Last month, according to a report by Axios, US Vice President JD Vance had a tense phone conversation with Netanyahu earlier this week, during which he told the premier off for what he viewed as overly rosy assumptions about the war in Iran.

Read | 'Bibi Really Sold It': A Rebuke In Vance-Netanyahu Tense Call Amid Iran War

According to the outlet, Vance pressed Netanyahu on his confidence regarding the likelihood of regime change. One US official told Axios that "Before the war, Bibi really sold it to the president as being easy, as regime change being a lot likelier than it was. And the VP was clear-eyed about some of those statements," referring to Netanyahu by his nickname.

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