A tense, camera-ready handshake between President Donald Trump and a defiant world leader at a peace summit in Egypt has the internet in a frenzy, as viewers zoomed in and claimed to read their lips during the awkward exchange.
It’s no secret that the relationship between Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron has been rocky and tense over the past few years, and more so recently after Macron, along with other countries, recognized Palestinian statehood.
But the odd handshake between the two leaders as they also grasped each other’s arms lasted around 25 seconds and, at one point, seemed to morph into what appeared to be an arm-wrestling-type move.
“Trump won’t let go,” a Threads user commented.
“I read his lips. Macron definitely said ‘what the fcuk…let my hand go!’” this Threads user observed.
“I wouldn’t touch Trump with a ten foot tree branch,” another stated.
“Looks like old trumpy is going to have to get the hand makeup out again to cover those bruises,” Bradley J. Schuelke posted on Threads.
“Grandpa let me go. Someone get grandpa away from me,” another Threads user hilariously joked.
And the comments just kept coming, “Trump is such a ‘control-freak’ with his handshakes…it’s actually rather creepy!”
At least one lip reader said the two may have threatened each other before agreeing to talk later, according to a report in The Mirror.
“Nice to see you, so you agreed?” Trump appeared to ask Macron as he shook his hand, the lip reader Nicola Hickling suggested. Then Macron seemed to say something else as he faced away from the camera, with Trump seeming to ask, “Is it genuine?”
“Of course,” Macron replied.
“OK, so now I want to know why. You hurt me. I already know,” Trump seemed to say. “I am making peace.”
Hickling then suggested Macron tried to disengage by tapping Trump’s hand and saying, “Excuse me.”
But that didn’t work as Trump seemed to ignore the request and clamped down on Macron’s hand even tighter.
“Let’s handle this behind closed doors,” Macron appeared to say. “I only hurt the other,” Trump replied.
“I see. We will have to see about that — you will see what is about to happen,” Hickling said Macron warned.
“I’d like to see you do it,” Trump snapped back, she said. “Do it. I’ll see you in a bit.”
A similar handshake occurred eight years ago during Trump’s first term and after a young Macron, who had never held elected office before, won the French presidency. Trump had never held elected office before either, but he was almost double Macron’s age.
That 29-second handshake occurred in 2017 while Trump was visiting France and similarly evolved from a shake to an arm grasp midway through.
A 39-year-old Macron, trying to appear strong, at the time described that white-knuckle hand grasp as “a moment of truth.”
“My handshake with him – it wasn’t innocent,” Macron told the Journal du Dimanche newspaper. “It’s not the be-all and the end-all of a policy, but it was a moment of truth.”
“Donald Trump, the Turkish president or the Russian president see relationships in terms of a balance of power,” Macron said. “That doesn’t bother me. I don’t believe in diplomacy by public abuse, but in my bilateral dialogues I won’t let anything pass.”
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