I have no idea why you would assume Israel had to resort to extortion to get Trump to help them bomb Iran. We bombed Venezuela a few weeks ago, no extortion required.

It's far more likely he was did it because Hegseth thought it would be more manly or something more ego driven than extortion. More likely it's just another example of flooding the zone to forget about the Epstein files and the stagnating economy

See, here is what I've observed. I don't expect to change your POVs. Nevertheless...

The issue started when Israel was ready to have recognition from Saudi Arabia on their statehood. This would make Hamas irrelevant. And puts Sunnis (Iran) lesser recognised. Meanwhile Shia's (Saudi) will become the defacto in the Muslim world and half of Muslim world would either tolerate or be OK with Israel. Hamas attack on Israel at Oct 7 stopped that. Hamas has been supported by Iran for a long time. So in the whole Gaza - Israel thing, Iran was backing Hamas. Then they proxied with them by providing assistance. Then they eventually directly got involved.

You need to understand, there was good period of peace between Israel & Palestine until Oct 7.

While I reject US toppling govts around the world, Iran's hand is not clean in this one. But also, US thought this would be as easy as Venezuela and killing Iran's leader will stop this. Interfering in other countries biz have consequences. And in this case, it's true for Iran & US.