Unnecessary escalation

Trump’s Syria envoy calls Israeli air strikes on base ‘unnecessary escalation’

It’s the Trump administration’s latest condemnation of an Israeli military operation since the two countries launched a joint attack on Iran in February.

By Gregory Svirnovskiy

The top U.S. envoy to Syria on Tuesday accused Israel of striking an airbase in the country, less than a day after White House envoy Jared Kushner met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for high-profile talks on disarmament in Gaza.

“We are deeply concerned that the confirmed Israeli airstrikes on Abu al-Duhur Airbase constitute an unnecessary escalation that does not advance regional stability,” wrote Tom Barrack, the special presidential envoy for Syria who is also the U.S. ambassador to Turkey, in a post on X.

It’s the Trump administration’s latest condemnation of an Israeli military operation since the two countries launched a joint attack on Iran in February. Netanyahu’s plans have often clashed with a White House strategy that has oscillated between emphasizing war and peace.

President Donald Trump has struggled to exert influence over Israel since returning to the White House, with his attention split between a war in Iran, the drug trade in South America and Russia’s four-year-long incursion into Ukraine.

Just last week, Netanyahu rejected a White House-backed peace plan in which Hamas would relinquish the reins in Gaza and Israeli troops would withdraw from the strip.

In Syria, Israeli troops have hit a country governed by one of the president’s favored world leaders. Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa visited the White House last November, and Trump has described al-Sharaa as a “young, attractive guy, tough guy.”

“The Al-Sharra government has neither adopted a predatory posture nor maintained proxy forces,” Barrack wrote in his post criticizing the strike. “It has, in fact, repeatedly indicated a preference for de-escalation with Israel. The United States has in the past, and will continue in the future, to host discussions to encourage diplomatic cadence over kinetic frustration for both nations.”

In a statement Tuesday, the Syrian foreign ministry called the attack “an unjustified act of aggression, a flagrant violation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and a dangerous escalation that threatens security and stability in the region.”

It’s far from the first time the Trump administration has broken with Netanyahu’s government in recent months. Trump shared a fiery phone call with the Israeli prime minister in June after his country struck Lebanon and complicated U.S. ceasefire talks with Iran.

“We have a little dispute over Lebanon,” he said at a G7 press conference later that month in France. “I say, ‘You can do a little softer touch, Bibi. You don’t have to knock down a building every time somebody walks into it that’s from Hezbollah.’”

The Israeli Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.