Photo: The White House, via Wikimedia Commons (public domain). File photo of Trump and Netanyahu at the White House, not a photo of Saturday's phone call.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pressed President Donald Trump in a phone call on Saturday to launch fresh military strikes against Iran immediately after Tuesday's midterm elections, according to a report by Axios. Trump, the report says, wants to give negotiations with Tehran more time to play out — even as he warned at a campaign rally on Sunday that the United States may eventually have to give Iran "the hammer" if no deal is reached.
The split, reported by Axios and carried by multiple outlets, is the clearest sign yet of a disagreement between the two allies over what comes after the vote. With Americans set to decide control of Congress on Tuesday, November 3, the question of whether the eight-month-old US-Israeli war on Iran resumes or winds down is now hanging over the final days of the campaign.
The Saturday call
According to Axios, citing one US official and one Israeli official, Trump and Netanyahu spoke on Saturday about the state of negotiations with Iran and the possibility of resuming military operations. Netanyahu urged strikes immediately after the midterms, concerned that Washington's continued pursuit of diplomacy could leave Iran's nuclear programme intact. Trump, by contrast, was eager to let the negotiations play out.
The two sides characterised the conversation differently: the Israeli source described it as "tough," while the American source called it "direct." Both the White House and the Israeli prime minister's office declined to comment on the report, according to Axios.
Speaking to reporters in Iowa on Sunday, Trump confirmed he had spoken with Netanyahu the day before. "Just had a very good talk with him," he said, adding that Iran was among the subjects discussed, without giving further details.
What Trump said in Iowa
Trump's public remarks on Sunday kept both tracks open at once. At a campaign rally in Dubuque, Iowa, he said he wanted to end the conflict and save lives, but warned that patience had limits. "And the only reason why I'm not finished with Iran is I want to be nice. I want to try and save all those lives if I can… But at some point we're going to have to give them the hammer," he told supporters, according to the Times of Israel.
He has made similar warnings before. Speaking to reporters on Saturday, Trump said negotiations with Iran were "going fine" and that he was not "in much of a hurry," but added that Washington still had to "take care" of one or two sites, including a suspected underground nuclear facility known as Pickaxe Mountain. "We can do that in 10 minutes," he said. He has also told Congress he does not intend to launch strikes against Iran before the midterm elections.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Saturday that Trump has not decided whether to launch new strikes, but would prefer to resolve the conflict diplomatically.
The diplomacy track
The diplomatic track is still moving. Iranian negotiators were in Doha on Sunday for a third consecutive day of talks with Qatari mediators aimed at pushing for a deal to end the war, an official briefed on the discussions told Reuters. Qatari mediators spent more than 12 hours in Tehran on Friday before the talks moved to Doha, and the discussions have been coordinated in regular contacts with Washington.
The engagement has also included a letter sent last week by Vice President JD Vance to Mohsen Rezaei, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, about restarting formal negotiations — the highest-level US outreach to Tehran in several months, according to Axios. Iran's security chief disclosed the letter on Saturday.
But no agreement has been announced. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said no deal has been reached so far and that progress depends on Washington answering questions Tehran has raised. Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, ordered the armed forces on Saturday to be ready to answer any attack with an immediate response "without geographical limitations."
Trouble at sea in the Strait of Hormuz
At sea, tensions rose further on Sunday. Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy said two oil tankers, including a supertanker, exploded after striking naval mines while using what it called an "unauthorized route" through the Strait of Hormuz, according to Iranian state media. The IRGC said the vessels had switched off their navigation and identification systems and had ignored warnings; it did not name the vessels or give information about their crews, and the claims could not be independently verified.
Separately, Britain's UK Maritime Trade Operations agency said a merchant vessel's master had relayed a Mayday call reporting that another vessel had been struck by an unknown projectile in the strait. It was not clear whether the UKMTO alert and the IRGC statement referred to the same vessels.
What happens next
The next two days are the hinge. If the Doha talks produce a path back from the brink before Americans vote on Tuesday, the war that began on February 28 with joint US-Israeli strikes on Iran could move toward an end. If diplomacy stalls, the warnings from both sides — Netanyahu's push for immediate strikes, Trump's "hammer," and Tehran's promise of a geographically unrestricted response — become the week's main event.
Sources: Axios, November 1, 2026 (via The Economic Times, The Hindu, Al Arabiya and The Times of India); Reuters, November 1, 2026 (Doha talks); The Times of Israel, November 2, 2026 (Iowa rally remarks); IRGC Navy statement via Iranian state media, November 1, 2026 (tanker claims, not independently verified); UKMTO advisory, November 1, 2026. The account of the Trump-Netanyahu call rests on two anonymous officials cited by Axios; both governments declined to comment.