Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton revealed that during her tenure as America’s top diplomat, she faced “constant” and “relentless” pressure from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and then-Defence Minister Ehud Barak to secure Washington’s backing for a preemptive military strike against Iran.
The disclosure offers a look at the intense behind-the-scenes friction that plagued US-Israel relations during the Obama administration, as Washington prioritised a combination of crippling economic sanctions and intense diplomacy to halt Iran’s nuclear programme, while Jerusalem aggressively pushed for a kinetic solution.
A 'relentless' campaign for war
According to Clinton, the diplomatic blitz from Israel's top two political leaders was unyielding. Netanyahu and Barak consistently used high-level meetings, telephone calls, and intelligence briefings to pressure the US into greenlighting, or directly participating in, a strike on Iran’s underground nuclear facilities, particularly the heavily fortified Fordow enrichment plant.
"There was constant pressure, relentless pressure, from Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defense Minister Barak to support a military strike," Clinton stated, reflecting on her time in office from 2009 to 2013.
Hillary Clinton:
Netanyahu believes that war is his friend because his political standing is under attack from a lot of different directions.
And he wants to contain the opposition by creating conflict so that he tries to rally the country behind him.
I think this Iran deal… pic.twitter.com/kYkeMRh24N
— Clash Report (@clashreport) June 16, 2026
The Israeli leadership’s core argument at the time was that Iran was rapidly approaching a "zone of immunity"—a point beyond which its nuclear facilities would be buried too deeply to be destroyed by conventional military action, effectively rendering Israel helpless to stop a nuclear-armed Tehran.
Red lines vs sanctions
The differences between Washington and Jerusalem over how to deal with Iran increasingly played out in public during Hillary Clinton's tenure as secretary of state, eventually erupting into a sharp and highly visible dispute in 2012 over the issue of nuclear "red lines."
The United States favoured a strategy of prevention through sustained pressure. Washington worked to assemble an unprecedented international coalition aimed at crippling Iran's economy through sweeping oil and banking sanctions, while leaving room for diplomacy to succeed. Although U.S. officials repeatedly insisted that "all options remained on the table," they resisted setting explicit deadlines or publicly committing to military action.
Israel, by contrast, pushed for a far more confrontational approach. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu argued for clear and non-negotiable "red lines" that would trigger action if Iran crossed specific nuclear thresholds. Israeli leaders maintained that sanctions alone were insufficient and warned that, without a credible military threat and firm deadlines, Tehran would simply continue advancing its nuclear programme under the cover of negotiations.
The disagreement reached a boiling point in September 2012 when Clinton publicly declared that the United States was "not setting deadlines" for Iran. Netanyahu responded forcefully, using a press conference to criticise the international community's reluctance to draw clear boundaries.
Keeping the trigger at bay
Despite the immense strain on the bilateral relationship, Clinton and Barack Obama held their ground. US officials argued that an Israeli strike would only temporarily delay Iran’s capabilities while triggering a catastrophic regional war, potentially drawing US forces back into a massive West Asian conflict just as Washington was drawing down its presence in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Instead, Clinton's State Department focused on aggressively building an international oil embargo against Iran, convincing major buyers like the European Union, Japan, and India to slash imports.
