President Donald Trump has promised to be an “America First” president and, in carrying out that promise through a little more than his first 100 days, has raised some concerns in Israel.

In recent weeks, the United States came to an agreement with the Houthis to stop their tit-for-tat war that excluded any mention of the Houthi-Israel war, the U.S. has restarted conversations with Iran about its nuclear program, and Trump is not stopping in Israel during his first trip to the Middle East since his return to office.

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“A pattern is forming here, which is rather striking,” Aaron David Miller, who worked in the State Department for more than two decades for Democratic and Republican administrations, told the Washington Examiner. “I don’t think any of the administrations I worked for, and I can’t even think of the ones that I didn’t, that would have done over the last several months what this administration has done with respect to an independence of decision-making vis-à-vis Israel.”

Trump has boasted that he is the most pro-Israel president in recent history, and initial actions he took demonstrated more support for Israel than his predecessor. Trump lifted a Biden-era restriction on heavy bombs, removed sanctions on Israeli settlers accused of carrying out violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, and floated the idea of removing all Palestinians from Gaza.

But, his administration’s actions more recently have raised eyebrows as the U.S. has pursued its own interests, some of which do not align exactly with Israel’s.

“I think Israel is a bit alarmed that what they expected from President Trump, which was to be extremely supportive, very cooperative and even been malleable, in favor of some of their preferences is not the President Trump that they are experiencing,” former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro told the Washington Examiner. “It’s not that he’s not supportive, but he’s made a number of decisions, or at least forecast other decisions that are clearly at odds with their preferences, and sometimes without any consultation.”

The U.S. military agreed to end its nearly two-month campaign against the Iran-backed Houthis this month. U.S. defense officials said the military hit more than 1,000 targets during the unrelenting military campaign. Yet, days before the president announced the deal, a Houthi-fired ballistic missile evaded Israel’s air defense systems and struck Ben Gurion International Airport, which escalated their conflict.

The deal “implicitly accepted the reality that Houthi attacks against Israel will continue,” Miller said.

The president said the Houthis agreed to stop firing at U.S. naval vessels in the region and at commercial vessels transiting the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, as the group has since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war. Houthi leaders explicitly said they would continue attacking Israel.

“The president made a deal with the Houthis for suspending fire against traffic through the Red Sea, maritime traffic, which didn’t include Houthi fire on the state of Israel, so that’s acting according to America’s interests,” former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren told the Washington Examiner. “It’s not Israel’s interest. We try to be on the same page as often as possible. We can’t always have confluent interests. America is a very big country located far from the Middle East. It’s not threatened with national extermination.”

In addition to negotiating with the Houthis, the Trump administration has also begun negotiating with Hamas for the release of American hostages and with Tehran over its nuclear program.

Hamas released Edan Alexander, the last remaining living American hostage, on Monday. Trump said ahead of his release that it was “a step taken in good faith.” The agreement was different from the previous times Hamas agreed to free the hostages it took on Oct. 7, 2023.

Netanyahu, after meeting with Steve Witkoff, one of Trump’s special envoys involved in the negotiations, has decided to dispatch a delegation to Doha, Qatar, to continue negotiations on a hostage deal, while the prime minister also told wounded Israeli reservists that Israel may agree to a short-term deal but would not end the war.

“The situation has changed,” Netanyahu told the reservists in a video his office released. “In the coming days, we will go in [to Gaza] with full force to complete the operation. Completing the operation means subduing Hamas. It means destroying Hamas.”

The Trump administration is also looking at a new way to provide humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, even as Israel has made the calculation to restrict aid to put increased pressure on Hamas to make a deal.

“It is a humanitarian operation that was initiated by the president and his mandate for us to get aid into the people who most desperately need it, but to do it in such a way as to not let Hamas control it,” U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee said last week.

Witkoff has described Gaza as “uninhabitable” and said it could take more than a decade to complete reconstruction efforts.

With several of Iran’s proxies reeling from direct conflicts with Israel in the roughly 19 months since Hamas’s attack, Israel has considered trying to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities, while the U.S. is pursuing diplomatic channels.

“Yes, the Biden administration was criticizing us, sometimes condemning us for our conduct in the war in Gaza, and I haven’t heard any serious criticism coming out of the White House since the inauguration, so there’s a big difference there,” Oren said. “But that doesn’t mean Israel doesn’t have concerns about the negotiations between the United States and Iran. We’re very much concerned that the president does not sign a newer version of the Iranian nuclear deal.”

The White House has sent mixed signals on what it wants from Iran regarding the nuclear negotiations, though the administration has said it prefers diplomacy to military action. Last week, Trump said he was committed to the “full dismantlement” of Iran’s nuclear program, while Vice President JD Vance said Tehran could keep its “civil nuclear power.”

“I think at the moment, there’s quite a lot of disquiet among Israeli leaders about how Trump is operating and how he’s treating them, very much like he treats everybody else,” Shapiro added. “It’s very transactional.”

Israeli President Isaac Herzog told German outlet Die Welt this week that he supports giving the U.S. a chance for diplomatic success.

“What we care most about is, of course, No. 1, the negotiations with Iran on a nuclear deal, or anti-nuclear deal, meaning making sure that Iran does not get to nuclear capabilities under any circumstances,” Herzog said. “Our position is clear. Iran should not be able in any way, and if that requires also military activity and military operation, let it be. But we give a chance to a dialogue.”

The various subjects the Trump administration is working on in the Middle East, and whether they align with Israel’s national interests, are less about a divide between the two countries and more about the president’s desire to get the best deals for the U.S. possible from friends and foes alike, Miller said.

“I’m not predicting, I’m not suggesting, I’m not even arguing that we are on the cusp of a major fracture between Trump and the Israelis,” he said. “I don’t believe that to be the case. I do think, however, that unlike Joe Biden, who had a deep and abiding love for the idea of Israel, the people of Israel, the security of Israel, Donald Trump’s views of Israel are far more transactional.”

Trump departed Monday for his first trip to the Middle East since the start of his second term. He is expected to stop in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, but not Israel.

The administration and Israel have very different views on Qatar, which has acted as a mediator, along with the U.S. and Egypt, between Israel and Hamas. Qatar has offered Trump a luxurious Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet to be used as Air Force One, which the president defended Monday.

HOUTHI ‘CAPITULATION’ AGAINST US DOESN’T END ISRAEL CONFLICT

“I think that was a very nice gesture,” Trump said during a press conference in the Roosevelt Room. “Now I could be a stupid person, say, ‘Oh no, we don’t want a free plane.’ We give free things out. We’ll take one too, and it helps us out.”

Comparatively, Israel is much more skeptical of Qatar, which houses Hamas’s international leaders outside Gaza and is a large financial backer.