On Monday, appearing with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Donald Trump responded to last week’s news that he had disclosed highly classified information to the Russians, saying “Just so you understand, I never mentioned the word or the name ‘Israel’.” Last week, citing anonymous sources, the New York Times reported that Trump had passed along information which had come to the United States from Israel, but made no claim that Trump had spoken the word “Israel” in his controversial Oval Office meeting with Russian figures Sergey Lavrov and Sergey Kislyak. Speaking to reporters in Jerusalem, Trump was attempting to deflect the issue, according to a tweet by Greg P. Miller, one of the authors of the original story, who said that this is an example of Trump stalling, while appearing to deny a statement without actually denying it. But Trump’s statement in Jerusalem may backfire on him, as it implicitly confirms that he did in fact talk to the Russians about classified information, an ongoing story that he and his White House team haven’t figured out a good answer for yet.
Beleaguered Trump insists he ‘never mentioned Israel’
