Ron Dermer, former Ambassador to the US and a close confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, about the meeting between Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House, during which the president received a golden beeper.
During a closed-door speech before the Board of Governors of the Jewish Agency, Minister of Strategic Affairs and Netanyahu’s close confidant, Ron Dermer, shared an amusing anecdote about the meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House. The details were first reported by Ynet.
“We gave President Trump a golden pager,” Dermer recounted. “The next day, Vice President Vance asked for one of his own. I told him, ‘Alright, but you’ll get a silver pager!’ We had one made for him, and he received it last week.” Dermer added with a smile, “Now there’s a whole competition in the administration over who will get the bronze one.”
As previously reported, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented U.S. President Donald Trump with a golden beeper during their White House summit in Washington. The pager given to Trump bore an English inscription reading, “Press with both hands.” This phrase referenced the wildly successful pager operation in which thousands of rigged pagers, sold by the Mossad to Hezbollah, detonated, causing hundreds of casualties and thousands of injuries among Hezbollah terrorists.
“I Am Certain We Will Crush Hamas Completely”
During his speech, Dermer expressed confidence in Israel’s ability to defeat Hamas in the ongoing campaign. “I am certain we will crush Hamas completely, but we must ensure the hostages are rescued first,” he stated. He recalled a conversation during the war with former U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who told him, “Hamas is an idea, and you can’t destroy an idea.” Dermer responded, “Nazism was also an idea – and there is no Nazi state. We must ensure that Hamas does not control territory and remains just an idea.”
Trump and Netanyahu in the Oval Office | Photo: Avi Ohayon, GPO
Regarding the stalled negotiations over the ongoing deal with Gaza, Dermer noted, “We have not finished the job in Gaza. We need to complete it, but we will do our best to bring the hostages back first.” He emphasized the significant efforts being made to secure the release of more hostages and expressed support for Witkoff’s plan for Gaza: “We are waiting to see how Witkoff’s plan develops, and we support it.”
