Trump seemingly believes he was the President last fall after confusing statement about Lebanese pager attacks

The arguments about Bidens age and competence began quickly into his last Presidency, but what about Donald Trump?

In a bizarre statement to TIME, Donald Trump seemingly claimed that he greenlit the deadly pager attacks in Lebanon on Sept 17 and 18, 2024.

TIME magazine sat down with President Donald Trump for an interview published on Thursday, October 23, to discuss his Gaza peace deal, meant to broker a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel’s defence forces (IDF), but has seemingly done little to stop the senseless murder in Palestine committed by the Israeli government.  

During the interview, TIMEs’ reporter brought up attacks committed by Israel against the Lebanese group Hezbollah (a group funded by Iran, Syria, Lebanese diaspora, and in parts by Israel itself). Broaching the topic sparked Trump to blurt out a ‘fact’ that took the interviewer by surprise:

“All of those attacks were done under my auspices, you know, with Israel doing the attacks—with the pagers and all that stuff,” Trump, who was not the president at the time, but in the midst of his campaign against Joe Biden, told TIME. “They let me know everything [happening],”

He then added that “And sometimes I’d say no—and they’d be respectful of that.”

It’s fairly clear that Trump was referring to the attack on Hezbollah in September, in which the IDF booby-trapped pagers used by the group. The attack, which seemed straight out of a special forces movie, killed at least 35 people, including children; thousands were injured alongside the deaths.

It was estimated that each of the rigged pagers had the strength of a hand grenade, meaning the vast majority of the injuries were to bystanders standing in the blast radius.

The first wave of pagers was detonated on September 17, with a second wave detonated the next day. The most egregious example being the detonation of a walkie-talkie during a funeral for four deceased bystanders from the previous day. The deceased being mourned included an 11-year-old child and a nurse, both bystanders.

The White House was seemingly forced to find some truth to the claim, stating, “The definition of auspices is support and approval. President Trump supported the action,”