Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and US President Donald Trump on July 8, 2026 during the 2026 NATO Summit in Ankara, Türkiye.Image: keystone
July 8, 2026, 9:03 p.mJuly 8, 2026, 9:03 p.m
After his public argument with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, US President Donald Trump has significantly softened his tone towards Italy. While he again sharply criticized Spain at the NATO summit in Ankara, he said of Italy: “Italy was good.” Almost all allies were good. “You just had a bad moment.” However, Spain was “very bad,” he said.
Trump was alluding to the dispute over what he saw as the inadequate support of several NATO partners in the conflict with Iran. According to him, he asked several allies whether they wanted to help, but received the answer that in this case they would “prefer to stay outside”. He didn’t like that, Trump said. Great Britain has declared that it only wants to help after the end of the war.
At the same time, he emphasized the cohesion of the alliance partners with a view to the NATO summit. If there is one word that describes the summit, it is “unity”.
Several mocking posts put a strain on the relationship with Meloni
Recently, Trump repeatedly attacked Meloni. He claimed that Meloni begged him for a photo together at the G7 summit. Meloni dismissed this as “completely made up”. Trump later followed up with a mocking post in which he wrote about a photo of Meloni and him: “Restraining order needed” – in other words: “No approach necessary”. Afterwards, Trump made it clear that his criticism was also about what he saw as a lack of support in the Iran war. Italy had refused to allow US planes to land at the Sigonella base in Sicily.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez described the US-Israeli attack on Iran as contrary to international law and banned US forces from using joint military bases in southern Spain. (sda/dpa)