‘Be Very Careful’: Trump Cautions Netanyahu Against Attacking Qatar, Calls It ‘Great US Ally’ | World News

File photos of Donald Trump, Benjamin Neyanyahu (AP)

Donald Trump has cautioned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu against taking an aggressive stance toward Qatar, underscoring the Gulf state’s importance as a strategic partner to Washington.

“They have to be very, very careful. They have to do something about Hamas, but Qatar has been a great ally to the United States,” the US President said while talking to a reporter.

“A lot of people don’t know that,” Trump said.

He went on to praise Qatar’s Emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, and said, “I told the Emir, who I think is a wonderful person, actually, I said, you need better public relations because you don’t really get the public relations.”

“I mean, people talk of it so badly. And they shouldn’t be. Qatar has been a very great ally,” the US President said.

Israel targeted the Hamas leadership in Doha in air strikes that were condemned by Qatar, which has served as one of the venues for ceasefire talks.

On Sunday, Qatar’s Prime Minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, denounced Israel as foreign ministers from Arab and Muslim nations met to discuss a possible unified response to Israel’s attack on Doha targeting the leadership of the militant group Hamas.

Sheikh Mohammed said Qatar remained committed to working with Egypt and the United States to reach a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war that has devastated the Gaza Strip after Hamas’s attack on Israel nearly two years ago.

However, he said that the Israeli strike that killed six people, five members of Hamas and a local Qatari security force member, represented “an attack on the principle of mediation itself.”

“This attack can only be described as state terrorism, an approach pursued by the current extremist Israeli government, which flouts international law,” the minister said.

“The reckless and treacherous Israeli aggression was committed while the state of Qatar was hosting official and public negotiations, with the knowledge of the Israeli side itself, and with the aim of achieving a ceasefire in Gaza,” he said.

Al Thani made the comments before a meeting on Monday of leaders from those nations.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu faces increasing pressure from the Israeli public over the fate of the remaining hostages held in Gaza.

There are still 48 hostages remaining in Gaza, of whom 20 are believed by Israel to still be alive.