June 16 (UPI) -- U.S. President Trump cautioned Israel against taking out the Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as part of its military offensive targeting the country's nuclear program and, potentially, toppling the regime.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly discussed with Trump an opportunity that had opened up for Israel to kill Khamenei, but Trump shut it down, saying it wouldn't be a good idea, three U.S. officials told CBS News on Sunday.
The conversation occurred at an unspecified point over the weekend and after Israel launched its first wave of massive strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities early Friday.
The two leaders have been in close contact since before the crisis and are maintaining almost daily contact, speaking at the beginning of last week, on Thursday, Friday and at the weekend, according to a Washington-based Israeli official.
Israel's four-day wave of airborne assaults, some from covert units operating on Iranian soil, has been concentrated on the country's nuclear development program, military and energy targets and its senior military commanders and top nuclear scientists, 12 of whom have been killed.
The commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard's elite Quds Force, Gen. Esmail Qaani was also killed in an Israeli strike Saturday, five years after replacing Qassem Soleimani killed on Trump's orders in what he said was a preventative strike in January 2020 during his first term.
The political leadership has so far remained off limits in Israel's calculus in its confrontation with Tehran.
However, an Israeli official said that while there was a general policy of not carrying out political assassinations, he warned that senior Iranian figures with the final say on military and nuclear matters ought to be looking over their shoulders.
"The Supreme Leader should be changing bedrooms at night," he said.
There has been no official comment from Trump or the White House.
Posting on his Truth Social platform, Trump pledged to bring the conflict to an end, citing his recent interventions in confrontations between India and Pakistan and between Egypt and Ethiopia, in which he dangled the prospect of increased trade with the United States, as a template.
"Iran and Israel should make a deal, and will make a deal, just like I got India and Pakistan to make, in that case by using trade with the United States to bring reason, cohesion, and sanity into the talks with two excellent leaders who were able to quickly make a decision and STOP!
"Likewise, we will have peace, soon, between Israel and Iran! Many calls and meetings now taking place. I do a lot, and never get credit for anything, but that's OK, the people understand. MAKE THE MIDDLE EAST GREAT AGAIN!"
Later Sunday, as he was departing for a meeting of the leaders of the G7 group of countries in Alberta, Trump, declined to answer a question on whether he had requested Israel de-escalate, saying only that the United States would continue to support Israel in its defense.
The United States has significant military and surveillance assets deployed in the vicinity, including a P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol, reconnaissance planes and a U.S. Navy destroyer diverted to the area to join two others and a carrier strike group already in situ.
Last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky claimed more than 20,000 U.S.-supplied anti-drone missiles bound for Ukraine were instead headed to the Middle East.
