Skip to main content

← Israeli Leaders on a Ground War

Ambassador Leiter and President Herzog on Boots on the Ground

Evidence rating: CONFIRMED for the quotes, reported by Politico (8 March 2026) and Israel National News (23 March 2026).

Israel's ambassador in Washington is the Israeli official who speaks most directly to American television audiences. In March 2026 he was asked, twice, about boots on the ground in Iran. He would not rule them out.

Face the Nation, 8 March 2026​

On CBS's Face the Nation, Ambassador Yechiel (Michael) Leiter was asked by Margaret Brennan whether Israel ruled out ground troops. Politico's headline: "Israeli ambassador to US declines to rule out putting boots on the ground in Iran." His words:

"We're ruling out the possibility of this regime remaining in the position where they can endanger us and their neighbors."

"If that includes putting boots on the ground — our preference is for the boots on the ground to be those of the Iranians. … They need to put their boots on the ground and ensure their future and the future of the region."

"When you're doing something that's so critical, you're not going to look at a stopwatch. This has to be finished. This is a terror-sponsoring state that has to be brought down."

(Politico, 8 March 2026).

Read the structure of the answer. The goal is fixed: the regime "has to be brought down," with no stopwatch. The means are open: "if that includes putting boots on the ground." Israel's preference is Iranian boots. A preference is not a limit. He did not say American boots were off the table, and he was not asked to rule out Israeli ones because, as Israel's own press reported three weeks later, Israeli infantry were not going (Israel Keeps Its Infantry Home).

State of the Union, 22 March 2026​

Two weeks later, on CNN with Dana Bash, Leiter said it again, as Israel National News reported under the headline "Ambassador Leiter: The strikes will continue until the Iranian regime falls":

"I think that we need boots on the ground, but they have got to be Iranian boots, and I think they're coming."

He said Israel would continue the campaign "until we bring this regime to its knees" (article page). "We need boots on the ground" is the Israeli government's position, stated by its ambassador to the United States. Six months later no Iranian uprising had toppled the government; the boots that the Pentagon was sizing, planning for, and moving toward the region were American (see Pentagon Ground Plans 2026).

President Herzog, 7 March 2026​

The day before Leiter's first interview, Israel's President Isaac Herzog told Fox News Live that he did not expect a deployment of Israeli or American troops in Iran, saying "it doesn't require troops on the ground" to bring down the regime, as Politico reported in the same article. Herzog's office is largely ceremonial; the government's war is run by the prime minister and cabinet. Within twelve days the prime minister was saying the opposite: "there has to be a ground component, as well" (Netanyahu: a ground component).

The same line from the Iranian opposition​

Reza Pahlavi, son of Iran's last shah, used the same formula on Fox News in September 2026, as transcribed by @urgentintel: "We're not asking America to put troops on the ground, as the president has said," and "The boots on the ground are the people of Iran themselves" (article page). "Iranian boots" is a phrase that comforts American audiences. It has not produced a single Iranian division, and it has not stopped the Pentagon from preparing American ones.

Status: Yechiel (Michael) Leiter is alive. Isaac Herzog is alive. Reza Pahlavi is alive.

Sources​

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

Last updated on