Herzog praises Trump’s support yet rules that any pardon must follow Israeli law, while Netanyahu thanks Trump but refuses to request clemency that requires admitting guilt in what he calls an “absurd” trial.
Donald Trump’s formal request that President Isaac Herzog “fully pardon” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has placed Israel’s ceremonial presidency, its judicial system, and its wartime leadership under a sudden white-hot spotlight. The letter from the former U.S. president—rare even in the long, intervention-heavy history of U.S.–Israel political intimacy—triggered immediate scrutiny not for its content alone, but for its attempt to reach directly into an active Israeli criminal proceeding.
Herzog responded with a mix of diplomatic warmth and constitutional firmness. His office said the president “holds President Trump in the highest regard” and “deeply appreciates President Trump’s unwavering support for Israel.” But the statement then pivoted to an unmistakable boundary: “Anyone seeking a Presidential pardon must submit a formal request in accordance with established procedures.” Advisers later reinforced the point more bluntly, noting that Herzog “cannot initiate a pardon based solely on the American leader’s request.”
The insistence was not rhetorical. Under Israeli law, a presidential pardon generally requires either a conviction or the completion of a substantive phase of the judicial process. Granting one in the middle of a multi-year trial with extensive evidence, witnesses, and motions still underway would be unprecedented. Even more importantly, the process cannot begin without Netanyahu initiating it himself—something he immediately ruled out.
In his interview with Australian broadcaster Erin Molan, Netanyahu expressed gratitude for Trump’s intervention. He said he appreciated Trump for being “so forthright” and argued that the corruption trial undermines the nation’s strategic priorities. “This trial is so absurd,” he said. “I spent three days a week [in court] — can you imagine this, running a war and now seeking to expand the peace.”
Netanyahu insisted that the trial harms both Israeli and American interests. “It hurts both American and Israeli interests, which is also what he said,” he added, aligning his position with Trump’s claim that legal proceedings hobble Israel’s wartime leadership. He described the charges as fabricated and politically motivated, calling them “an attempted political coup led by the police and state prosecution.”
But the core of his response—and the decisive factor in the pardon question—was unmistakable. Netanyahu said he will not request clemency if doing so requires confessing to any wrongdoing. “That’s not going to happen,” he declared. “Nobody suggests that that’s what I’ll do, and I certainly won’t do that.”
That refusal places Herzog’s position in a strangely fortified space. Even if Herzog wanted to entertain Trump’s request—which no Israeli president could publicly concede—Netanyahu’s refusal to seek a pardon seals the matter. Without an application, the president has no legal authority to consider the question, let alone act.
Politically, Herzog’s stance reinforces a principle he has guarded throughout his presidency: the judiciary, not international allies and not the executive, determines the outcome of corruption trials. Several senior legal figures quietly reinforced that message in background conversations with the Israeli press, noting that bypassing the trial now would risk long-term damage to Israel’s institutional integrity.
Trump’s request is therefore trapped between two immovable walls: Israeli legal procedure on one side, and Netanyahu’s refusal to admit guilt on the other. The former prime minister framed his stance as a matter of honor, legality, and national service. He maintains that the charges are illegitimate and that seeking a pardon would wrongly dignify them. His allies cast the trial as a weapon wielded by rivals to weaken him at the height of war and historic diplomacy.
Herzog’s allies, however, stress that the president’s duty is constitutional, not political. The message from the President’s Residence may have been wrapped in diplomatic gratitude toward Trump, but the substance was unyielding: the pardon system is a legal mechanism, not a political lever. No foreign leader—ally or adversary—can change that.
Trump’s intervention nonetheless electrified Netanyahu’s base, which sees the trial as a multi-year saga draining the prime minister’s time and energy at a moment of strategic transformation in the Middle East. For them, Trump’s letter reads as overdue validation.
Opponents see the opposite. They argue that the letter undermines the perception of Israel as a country where even the top leader faces judicial scrutiny without political shortcuts. Yair Lapid pointed to the foundational legal rule that a pardon typically requires admission of guilt and remorse. Netanyahu’s categorical refusal to admit anything, Lapid said earlier this year, closes the door to a pardon “before the conversation even begins.”
The Times of London obtained reactions from members of Herzog’s circle who described Trump’s request as “respectfully acknowledged but procedurally irrelevant.” One senior legal adviser told the paper that Netanyahu “would need to plead guilty or accept responsibility to even initiate the process,” something the adviser said is “incompatible with the prime minister’s public stance.” The same report noted that the President’s Office is determined to avoid being drawn into a political confrontation on the issue.
Within the coalition, several figures attempted to use Trump’s intervention to renew claims of judicial overreach, arguing that the trial drains critical wartime capacity and fractures national unity. Yet even they concede privately that the pardon route is blocked not by Herzog, but by Netanyahu’s own declared refusal.
That refusal also carries political resonance. As Netanyahu considers a run for another term, he is branding himself as unbowed: wrongfully accused, unwilling to confess, unwilling to seek mercy, and determined to “let the people decide.” A pardon—particularly one linked to admission of guilt—would undermine the personal narrative he has built across decades.
The result is a deadlock conducted politely on the surface but firmly beneath it. Trump’s gesture was warmly received personally but functionally dismissed. Herzog maintains the guardrails. Netanyahu refuses to activate the procedure. The judiciary continues its work.
In the end, the only path to a pardon runs through Netanyahu himself—and he has closed that door. The political theater may continue, but the legal reality remains unchanged: as long as Netanyahu insists the case is baseless and refuses to admit any wrongdoing, the president’s pardon power cannot be touched, no matter who asks for it.
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