Donald Trump boasts of record as 'peacemaker' before asking UN if he should 'annihilate' Iran
US president Donald Trump delivered a jarring address to the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, touting his record as a historic dealmaker before openly asking gathered world leaders whether he should completely "annihilate" Iran.
Speaking from the rostrum in New York, the 80-year-old president initially framed his foreign policy as a triumph of diplomacy, declaring: “While others have spoken of peace, I have made peace.”
Moments later, however, Trump’s tone shifted dramatically as he addressed the devastating military conflict currently destabilizing the Middle East.
“Do I annihilate the Islamic Republic, and do it quickly?” Trump asked the assembly of heads of state and diplomats. “Do I drive them into hell with no chance of survival and no hope of future greatness or generations? But I believe we’ll make a deal. Right after the election.”
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The stark rhetoric follows comments made over the weekend to Fox News, in which Trump admitted he was actively weighing “if and when do I blow the entire nation up,” deciding between “wiping Iran out, letting them rot economically or make a deal.”
The war, sparked by a joint US-Israeli bombing campaign launched on Feb. 28, is now nearing the end of its sixth month.
The strikes resulted in the deaths of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other high-ranking officials, while triggering widespread regional escalation.
The ensuing conflict has seen an Israeli invasion of Lebanon, cross-border clashes between Saudi Arabia and Yemen's Houthis, and targeted retaliatory strikes on US and allied facilities across Iraq and Kuwait, resulting in the deaths of at least 18 American service members.
The hostilities have also rattled energy markets, driving consumer fuel prices to near-record levels across the United States. Trump argued that a decisive resolution would stabilize global markets.
“If we stand united, we will soon see a world free of the last 51-year menace of Iranian terror,” Trump told the assembly. “And oil prices will come plummeting down, even lower than they were at the start of the conflict. And they were very low. In the United States, they were really low.”
While Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian was en route to New York on Tuesday, an Iranian diplomat seated in the hall remained visibly impassive during Trump's speech.
Throughout his wide-ranging remarks, Trump repeatedly referenced US military intervention abroad, pointing to the January military action in Venezuela that culminated in the arrest of Nicolás Maduro, who currently awaits federal trial in a Brooklyn detention center.
“When you add the United States and Venezuela together, we have more than 60% of the oil in the world,” Trump stated. “It was a war, but it’s perhaps the biggest deal ever made... To the victor belong the spoils.”
By explicitly invoking Venezuela while addressing the conflict with Iran, Trump appeared to signal a potential blueprint for how his administration could handle Tehran.
Reminding world leaders that the U.S. took control of Venezuelan oil interests by forcefully abducting and jailing Maduro, his warning ominously hints that a similar logic could apply to Iran.
Topics: Donald Trump, Iran
Phoebe Tonks