Netanyahu mourns Lindsey Graham, says Israel lost a great friend

Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had lost one of its greatest friends after the death of Sen. Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican who had just returned to Washington from Ukraine hours before he died at 71 from a brief and sudden illness.

In an exclusive interview on Meet the Press, Netanyahu said he was in a “state of shock” and remembered Graham as “so vibrant,” “full of life,” and “full of energy and dedication.” The Israeli prime minister praised Graham’s “clarity… courage… and convictions,” and called him a “beloved friend.” “Israel has lost one of its greatest friends,” Netanyahu said, while adding that “America has lost a great patriot.”

Graham’s death resonated far beyond South Carolina and Washington because he had become one of the most visible Senate advocates for Israel, Ukraine and a hard line on adversaries of the United States. He was widely seen as a major foreign-policy voice in the U.S. Senate and as one of Donald Trump’s closest allies in Congress, giving him unusual reach in debates over Middle East strategy, NATO commitments and sanctions policy.

Netanyahu singled out Graham’s position on Iran, saying the senator had been “very clear” about the need to knock out Iran’s nuclear program. That made Graham a durable ally for Israeli leaders pressing Washington to keep military pressure on Tehran and to resist diplomatic deals they viewed as too permissive. His death removes one of the most recognizable Republican voices pushing that position in the Senate.

The timing also sharpened the loss for Ukraine and NATO allies. Graham had been scheduled to appear on Meet the Press on Sunday morning, which would have been his 64th appearance on the program, underscoring how often he served as a national surrogate on foreign policy. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy noted that Graham had visited Ukraine 10 times since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, a record that reflected how deeply he had embedded himself in the trans-Atlantic coalition rallying behind Kyiv.