A pair of analysts warned on Tuesday that President Donald Trump appears to have suffered a "humiliating" blow from a U.S. ally, and it could have global repercussions.
Early Tuesday morning, Israel bombed the Qatari capital of Doha. Ben Rhodes, the former deputy national security advisor in the Obama administration, speculated on a recent episode of "Pod Save The World" that the strike was likely conducted using American military equipment that was sold to Israel as part of its war on Hamas.
The strike also put Trump in an awkward position, Rhodes argued. Trump is friendly with Qatar, as illustrated by the $400 million plane he accepted from them as a gift, and his Attorney General, Pam Bondi, once worked as a lobbyist for the Qatari government. However, Trump's other friend, Israel, is now attacking Qatar with weapons that Trump sold them.
"The Qatari prime minister had just met with Hamas to pressure them to take this Trump ceasefire deal, and this is completely humiliating for him," said podcast co-host Tommy Vietor, an Obama administration spokesperson. "His own country was bombed."
"Frankly, let's just add the U.S. to the list of humiliated countries," Rhodes said.
Rhodes mentioned that the U.S. has about 10,000 troops stationed in Qatar. Media reports indicate that the Trump administration wasn't notified of the strike until the missiles were in the air, which Rhodes said reveals a lot about the relationship between the two governments.
"This either punked Trump or Trump just doesn't care," Rhodes said.
There also could be global impacts from the bombing, he added.
"The other place where Hamas leaders tend to go is Turkey, and Israel has a lot of tensions with Turkey right now over Syria and other things," Rhodes said. "It's actually not inconceivable that Israel might strike in Turkey at some point."
"I'd remind you that Turkey is a member of NATO," he added. "We are at a point here where it's probably more likely that Netanyahu bombs a NATO country before Putin does."
"That shows you how absurd US foreign policy is," Rhodes said.
