Donald Trump lashed out at his Democratic rivals on Friday during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Florida, predicting disaster in the Middle East if he is not re-elected US president in November.

This meeting concluded Mr. Netanyahu’s visit to the US, during which he addressed the US Congress and then met separately with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, now the Democratic presidential candidate.

“We have incompetents leading our country,” Mr Trump said, sitting across from Mr Netanyahu. “If we win, things will be very simple. Everything will be resolved, and very quickly,” he assured.

But “if we don’t win, we may be facing major wars in the Middle East and maybe a third world war,” he added.

The Republican’s campaign later released a statement about the meeting, asserting that his intention is to “bring peace to the Middle East” if he returns to the White House in January 2025.

The tycoon and Mr Netanyahu sought to demonstrate their closeness during their meeting at Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago compound. The tones were much more cordial than during the right-wing Israeli prime minister’s meeting with Kamala Harris last Thursday.

“What has happened in Gaza in the last nine months is shocking,” the US vice president said, referring to “dead children” and “desperate and hungry people fleeing for safety.”

“We cannot look away from these tragedies. We cannot allow ourselves to become numb in the face of these sufferings,” she added while speaking to the press, promising that she would not be “silent.”

Yesterday, Mr Trump again branded Kamala Harris a “radical left” politician and said her comments showed a “disrespect” for Israel, whose US remains a key global ally.

The war in the Gaza Strip erupted on October 7 when Hamas’s military arm launched an unprecedented raid on southern Israel that killed 1,197 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli data. Of the 251 people abducted that day, 111 are still in the Gaza Strip, but 39 are believed to be dead, according to the Israeli military.

In retaliation, Israel has vowed to wipe out the Palestinian Islamist movement, in power in the enclave since 2007, which the US and EU designate as a terrorist organization, and its wide-ranging military operations since then have killed at least 39,175. people, the majority of them civilians, according to the latest figures from the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip.