Israel Hayom, Once Trump's Biggest Israeli Cheerleader, Runs Scathing Op-Ed: 'You Made a Colossal Mistake'

Israel Hayom, the Israeli daily owned by Trump megadonor and Republican Party financier Miriam Adelson, has published a scathing open letter addressed directly to President Donald Trump, accusing him of betraying Israel, humiliating America, and signing what the author calls "a surrender agreement with a murderous and cruel terror regime."

The op-ed, written by veteran Israeli journalist Danny Zaken and published Wednesday night, is extraordinary not only for its content but for its venue. Israel Hayom has been one of Trump's most consistently loyal boosters in the Israeli press, and Adelson herself is among the most significant Republican donors in modern American political history. The paper's willingness to publish a piece of this tone and this directness signals how deep the rupture between Israel and Washington has become since the signing of the U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding.

"You made a colossal mistake," Zaken writes, addressing Trump in the second person throughout the piece. "You failed by signing a surrender agreement with a murderous and cruel terror regime. You severely harmed American interests and the democratic and human values of the enlightened world, and you turned over the hourglass toward the next war, which your successors will have to deal with in the years to come."

Zaken, writing from near Jerusalem, does not frame his critique as opposition. He takes pains to document his history of supporting Trump, describing the relief in Israel when Trump was elected, crediting him for lifting the weapons embargo during the Gaza war, praising the Abraham Accords, and even defending Trump's decision to take credit for the joint U.S.-Israel strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities. The indictment is not from an enemy. It is from a believer who feels abandoned.

"When you were elected, there was a huge sigh of relief here in Israel, after more than a year of a difficult war and following a terrible massacre," Zaken writes. He credits Trump with pressing for regime change in Iran in meetings with Israeli officials, citing the presence of Mossad Director David Barnea and Prime Minister Netanyahu's military secretary Roman Gofman at joint strategic sessions where, Zaken writes, it was Trump himself who pushed hardest for the maximalist objective of toppling the regime.

The turn, in Zaken's account, was sudden and inexplicable. Intelligence assessments were showing the Iranian regime beginning to fracture from within. The economic blockade was working. And then Trump reversed course entirely.

"I am trying, and failing, to understand what caused this absurd change of direction, so contrary to everything you have said and done until now," Zaken writes. He dismisses the midterm elections as a "flimsy excuse," noting Trump is in his second and final term, and argues that the deal will hurt Republicans more than it helps them. He rejects the economic rationale as well, warning that any short-term drop in oil prices will be reversed the moment Iran uses its newly legitimized leverage over the Strait of Hormuz.

The piece also takes direct aim at Trump's recent personal attacks on Netanyahu. Trump told Israeli journalists he had "saved him from prison," a reference to Netanyahu's ongoing corruption trial. Zaken is blunt: "No, sir. The trial is continuing, and the independent court or the other competent authorities will determine that, not you." On Trump's claim that without him, Israel would not exist, Zaken writes: "Israel existed before you and will exist long after you. You have just now made that a little more difficult."

Zaken reserves particular fury for the regional consequences. He writes that leaders in Lebanon trying to reach a ceasefire deal with Israel told him directly that Trump "gave Hezbollah a shot in the arm at the organization's most difficult moment and sold our future." He warns that Gulf states beyond Qatar are now exposed to Iranian pressure and ultimatums, that the UAE, which took the political risk of joining the Abraham Accords, has been abandoned, and that Bahrain faces growing coup attempts fueled by a newly emboldened Tehran.

The conclusion is an appeal as much as an indictment. "Only if you walk this back and avoid reaching a final agreement with Iran might there be a correction," he writes. "We feel betrayed, nothing less."

That a piece of this nature appeared in Israel Hayom at all, under any byline, is the story. The paper was founded in 2007 by the late Sheldon Adelson specifically to provide Netanyahu, and by extension the broader Israeli right, with a loyal media platform. Under Miriam Adelson's continued ownership, it has remained closely aligned with both Netanyahu and Trump. Publishing a piece that calls Trump's Iran policy a "colossal mistake," compares him unfavorably to Barack Obama, and accuses him of humiliating America, is a measure of how dramatically the political landscape has shifted in Jerusalem since the MOU was signed.