President Trump criticizes Israeli strike in Qatar amid Gaza ceasefire talks

President Donald Trump voiced frustration overnight after Israel launched a strike in Qatar targeting Hamas leadership

(NBC)- President Donald Trump voiced frustration overnight after Israel launched a strike in Qatar targeting Hamas leadership — an attack Qatar denounced as cowardly and illegal.

“I was very unhappy about it, very unhappy about every aspect… we’ve got to get the hostages back, but I was very unhappy about the way that went down,” Trump said. He also wrote on social media: “Unilaterally bombing inside Qatar, a sovereign nation and close ally of the United States… does not advance Israel or America’s goals.”

Hamas leaders were in Qatar at the request of the U.S., which sought a neutral location for Gaza ceasefire talks. Those negotiations, mediated by Qatar for months, are now in jeopardy. Israeli hostage families expressed anguish, with one mother saying she is “trembling with fear” for her son still held in Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu authorized the strike following a deadly shooting at a Jerusalem bus stop that killed six Israelis. Netanyahu called the Hamas leaders targeted “the same terrorists who planned, launched and celebrated the horrific massacres of October 7th.”