United States (US) President Donald Trump held a telephonic conversation with Israeli Prime Minister (PM) Benjamin Netanyahu minutes before Israeli Air Force (IAF) fighter jets were supposed to launch a strike on Iran on Tuesday, The Jerusalem Post has reported.

 

Citing a source familiar with the development, Jerusalem Post said that US President Trump raised his voice at the Israeli PM, telling him, “Stop the attack.”

 

The report claims that Netanyahu could not say much during the call, though he repeatedly expressed gratitude to Trump.

 

“It was a tough conversation between Netanyahu and President Trump. Trump viewed this as a personal achievement and made it clear that no one, absolutely no one, would undermine it,” The Jerusalem Post quoted the source as saying.

 

Following the call, IAF pilots were directed to cease the attack that would have threatened the fragile ceasefire. As a compromise, Israel struck a radar station near Tehran, far from the originally planned targets, said the Post.

 

On Tuesday, after the ceasefire was announced by the US president, Israeli forces alleged that Tehran fired a missile at Tel Aviv, an accusation Iran vehemently rejected.

 

However, despite clarification from Iran, Israel had vowed to respond with more strikes in Iranian cities.

 

Speaking to reporters outside the White House before departing for the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) summit on Tuesday morning, Trump rebuked both Israel and Iran, saying that both sides "violated the ceasefire". 

 

Using a four lettered word, he said, "We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f*** they are doing, you understand that?"

 

"Israel, as soon as we made the deal, dropped a load of bombs the likes of which I’d never seen before, the biggest load that we’ve seen. I’m not happy with Israel … I’m not happy with Iran either, but I’m really unhappy if Israel is going out this morning," a visibility angry Trump stated. 

 

Following the statement, he wrote on Truth Social on the same day that Israel is not going to attack Iran, adding, “the ceasefire is in effect.”

The conflict between Iran and Israel began when the latter, on June 13, launched strikes in the former's cities, killing its top commanders and nuclear scientists.

 

Israel said that it wanted to remove any chance of Tehran developing nuclear weapons. Israel itself is widely assumed to have nuclear weapons, which it neither confirms nor denies.

 

Iran says its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only. Iranian officials have repeatedly said they do not plan to develop nuclear weapons but will pursue its right to nuclear energy and research.