Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denounced the United Nations General Assembly as a “swamp of antisemitic bile” during a fiery address Friday morning — as dozens of diplomats walked out in protest ahead of the speech.
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Netanyahu, 74, appeared at the annual UN gathering in New York shortly before the one-year anniversary of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel and the subsequent Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.
The prime minister used his time at the podium to slam the mountain of international criticism of Israel’s offensive in Gaza.
Dozens of diplomats walkout, top right, as Benjamin Netanyahu takes the stage on Friday morning.
He accused the UN of being a “swamp of antisemitic bile” that is “willing to demonize the Jewish state for anything.”
He also called the organization an “anti-Israel flat-earth society.”
The Likud party leader slammed the International Criminal Court’s allegations that Israel has deliberately targeted civilians in Gaza as the product of “profound moral confusion.”
He also had harsh words for the thousands of anti-Israel protesters who mobilized across the world over the past 11 months — including at tent encampments on university campuses throughout the US.
“We see yet another profound moral confusion when self-described progressives march against the democracy of Israel,” he said.
“Don’t they realize they support the Iranian-backed goons in Tehran and in Gaza, the goons who shot down protesters, murder women for not covering their hair and hang gays in public squares? Some progressives.”
Netanyahu spoke before a sparse crowd, as diplomats from several delegations — including all the Arab states — were seen potentially leaving the room in protest right before his appearance.
One of the absent delegations was Iran, which Netanyahu repeatedly addressed during his speech.
Netanyahu referenced his speech at the General Assembly last year, in which he outlined the difference between the “blessing” of reconciliation between Israel and Iran and the “curse of Iran’s unremitting aggression.”
He called out the Iranian government for backing terror groups, including Hamas, and mentioned how Tehran directly attacked Israel for the first time in April this year.
“I have a message for the tyrants of Tehran: If you strike us, we will strike you,” Netanyahu warned.
“There is no place — there is no place in Iran — that the long arm of Israel cannot reach. And that’s true of the entire Middle East.”
Netanyahu repeatedly emphasized Israel’s nearly year-long struggle in a war that now involves multiple fronts, as Hezbollah, the Houthis and militants in Syria and Iraq renewed their efforts against the Jewish state in response to the Gaza war.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the real war criminals are not in Israel. They’re in Iran. They’re in Gaza, in Syria, in Lebanon, in Yemen,” Netanyahu insisted.
“But I have a message for you: Israel will win this battle. We will win this battle because we don’t have a choice,” he added.
Netanyahu claimed that Israel had destroyed “23 out of 24” of Hamas’ terror battalions through “measured military operations” — and reiterated that Israel would not tolerate a situation in which the group could rebuild in Gaza after the war.
Shortly after Netanyahu’s speech, Israel rained down missiles on Hezbollah’s headquarters in Beirut, marking its most powerful attack on the group to date.
The explosions marked a serious escalation and came weeks after Israel confirmed that the focus of its war effort was shifting from Gaza to Lebanon.
Netanyahu’s office circulated an image of the prime minister on the phone approving the strike on the Lebanese capital.
Netanyahu’s team also announced that he would leave New York for Israel on Friday evening, one day earlier than originally planned.
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