President Donald Trump made a comment that landed as a bombshell for both the United States and Israel, saying the U.S. may stop giving money to Israel. In the hours since, the story has only grown stranger.

“Now, as far as paying Israel, Bibi Netanyahu and I have made a deal that we give Israel $4 billion a year, and we made a deal months ago that we’re stopping… We’ve already agreed that by the end of this year we won’t be paying Israel. Now we’ll help Israel if they need it,” Trump said in a Tuesday morning appearance on “Fox & Friends.”

Trump indicated the payments would end at the close of 2026 — even though the agreement does not set U.S. funding to stop until 2028. The agreement in question is the 2016 U.S.–Israel memorandum of understanding, concluded between the Obama administration and Netanyahu’s government, which provides $38 billion in military aid over ten years — grant money delivered as assistance, distinct from the weapons sales Trump said would continue.

The president has tried to clean up the remark, saying the United States would still sell weapons to Israel and could provide help if Israel needed it. That clarification came from Trump himself, however — not from a separate White House correction.

Fox host Brian Kilmeade was quick to ask what Trump meant, but the president never fully answered the question. Instead, Trump changed the subject and repeated that Israel “doesn’t need it,” meaning the money.

Several hours later, The Jerusalem Post reported that the White House said Trump had “misspoke.” The report included a striking detail: “Also, Trump did not make this announcement of his own initiative, with advisers nearby shepherding him through.”

“And the most stunning part of all of this was that Trump said ending the aid in 2026, as opposed to 2028, was all Netanyahu’s idea,” the newspaper wrote. According to the report, the president made no prepared policy announcement on his own initiative: “Rather, he tossed it out in response to a question in an interview on Fox News.”

That framing raises questions about why Trump would need advisers “shepherding him through” a Fox News interview in the first place.

It also fits Trump’s own account that Netanyahu raised the idea, rather than the president deciding independently to end the aid. Trump said Netanyahu “brought it up” and that the two had discussed it for a couple of years. As of the Post’s report, the “misspoke” explanation had surfaced through the newspaper’s coverage rather than an on-record White House statement, and no response from Israeli officials is reflected in the reporting so far.

As Media Matters for America fellow Matthew Gertz pointed out on Bluesky, the comment “wasn’t a one-off. Trump repeated it several times during the interview, answered multiple questions, gave his reasoning, and even said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked for it!”

The episode comes as questions about Trump’s health and mental wellness persist. Dr. Henry David Abraham, a Tufts psychiatry professor emeritus, told AlterNet last month that Trump’s “grandiosity,” angry outbursts, rambling speech and word-finding problems were “consistent with evolving dementia,” while also raising the possibility of a mood disorder. He emphasized that these were his assessments, not a diagnosis. That caveat reflects the American Psychiatric Association’s “Goldwater rule,” which deems it unethical for psychiatrists to offer professional opinions about public figures they have not personally examined.

Dr. John Paul Garrison, a clinical and forensic psychologist specializing in body language, watched Trump’s speech at the Reflecting Pool on Monday (related AlterNet coverage) and suggested the president is suffering a severe decline, possibly even accelerated by a stroke.