Netanyahu publicly endorsed Trump's 48-hour ultimatum to destroy Iran's power grid. "I think President Trump knows exactly what he's doing. And whatever we do, we do together," he stated — the most explicit public confirmation of joint US-Israeli war planning since operations began on 28 February.
The statement forecloses diplomatic distance that both governments had previously maintained. On 16 March, Trump denied knowledge of Israel's South Pars strike; Axios reported, citing US and Israeli officials, that the two leaders had coordinated it. Two days later, Netanyahu confirmed Trump had asked Israel to hold off on certain targets — an acknowledgement of coordination that still preserved the fiction of separate command structures. His endorsement of the power-grid threat abandons that fiction entirely. Both capitals are now publicly committed to an action that would cut electricity to approximately 88 million Iranians — hospitals, water treatment, cold-chain food storage, and what remains of civilian telecommunications.
For Tehran, the statement confirms what Iran has argued since 28 February: that this is a joint US-Israeli campaign, not an American operation with Israeli participation. That framing shapes Iran's retaliatory calculus. The Khatam al-Anbiya command already warned that strikes on Iranian power plants would trigger counter-strikes against energy, IT, and desalination infrastructure across the Gulf. Netanyahu's public embrace of the ultimatum gives Iran's leadership domestic justification for the broadest possible retaliation — and signals to Gulf states, already absorbing Iranian drone and missile strikes on their own energy facilities, that Israel shares responsibility for whatever follows.
Both leaders have also narrowed their own exits. Trump has oscillated between "winding down" rhetoric and approving what Defence Secretary Hegseth called "the largest strike package yet". Netanyahu, by publicly attaching himself to the power-grid threat before its Tuesday deadline, makes a climb-down costlier for either government. If the deadline passes without action, both absorb the credibility loss. If it does not, both own the consequences — and the counter-strike Iran has already promised.
