Speaking at the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump said the current wave of recognitions of Palestinian statehood represents a submission to Hamas’s “ransom demands,” rewards the terror group, and encourages conflict.

Trump also repeated his position that Iran must not have nuclear weapons, and his assertion that US bombers obliterated Iran’s uranium enrichment capacity during the 12-day Israel-Iran war in June.

In a speech lasting almost an hour, the president trumpeted his role in settling global disputes, called climate change “the greatest con job,” accused the UN of “funding an assault” on the West by supporting migrants, and told European nations they were “going to hell” because their immigration policies were insufficiently restrictive.

On Gaza, Trump said he has been “deeply engaged” in efforts to secure a hostage-ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. He accused Hamas of stonewalling on the efforts to end the war sparked by the terror group’s invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023.

“Unfortunately, Hamas has repeatedly rejected reasonable offers to make peace,” said Trump. “We can’t forget October 7, can we?”

He then blasted Western countries, including Britain, Canada and France, that recognized Palestinian statehood in the days ahead of the General Assembly.

“Now, as if to encourage continued conflict, some of this body is seeking to unilaterally recognize a Palestinian state,” said Trump.

“The rewards would be too great for Hamas terrorists for their atrocities. This would be a reward for these horrible atrocities, including October 7, even while they refuse to release the hostages or accept a ceasefire,” he added. “This could have been solved so long ago.”

“Instead of giving in to Hamas’s ransom demands, those who want peace should be united with one message: Release the hostages now,” Trump said, to applause in the chamber.

Trump reiterated that he wants all the remaining captives back at once rather than in the staggered releases of the two previous hostage deals.

“We have to stop the war in Gaza immediately,” he said. “We immediately have to negotiate peace. We gotta get the hostages back,” said Trump.

He said there were 20 living hostages and, apparently misspeaking, the remains of 38 slain captives being held in Gaza, and they all needed to be returned. There are currently 48 hostages held by Hamas – 20 believed to be alive, two others for whose well-being Israeli officials have expressed grave concern, and 26 confirmed dead by the IDF.

Talks for a Gaza ceasefire have stalled since Israel’s September 9 strike on Hamas’s leadership in Doha. Hostage families have accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of repeatedly thwarting negotiations.

Responding to Trump’s speech, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum applauded his “determination” to bring Israel and Hamas back to talks.

“Time is running out. The time has come for actions, for a comprehensive agreement on the return of all 48 hostages and the end to the war in Gaza,” the Forum said in a statement. “We call on Trump to demand Israel’s return to negotiations on the basis of known principles of the return of all hostages and the end of the war.”

Trump said he sought nuclear talks with Iran earlier this year out of a desire to keep the “number-one sponsor of terror” from attaining nuclear arms.

Iran, whose leaders are sworn to Israel’s destruction, has publicly rejected seeking nuclear arms, citing a purported ruling to that effect by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. However, Iran has enriched uranium to a level far beyond what is needed for civilian use and a short step away from weapons-grade, developed a large ballistic missile arsenal, and worked on weaponization.

“The world’s number one sponsor of terror can never be allowed to possess the most dangerous weapon,” Trump said. “That’s why, shortly after taking office, I sent the so-called Supreme Leader a letter making a generous offer. I extended a pledge of full cooperation in exchange for a suspension of Iran’s nuclear program. The regime’s answer was to continue their constant threats to their neighbors and US interests throughout the region and some great countries that are right nearby.” As a consequence, Trump said, the US resorted to force.

The US-Iran nuclear talks came to a halt after Israel, on June 13, launched a surprise strike on Iran’s nuclear program, missile production and military leadership. Iran, in response, launched drones and deadly missile attacks on Israel.

On June 22, the US carried out a strike on three key Iranian nuclear facilities, including one thought to be penetrable only by US-made “bunker buster” bombs. Two days later, the Israel-Iran war ended with a ceasefire mediated by Trump.

Trump, who had demanded that Iran give up on its uranium enrichment, said at the time that the US strikes had obliterated the Iranian facilities, despite leaked US intelligence reports to the contrary.

At the UN on Tuesday, Trump again lauded the results of the Israel-Iran war and the US strike.

“Today, many of Iran’s former military commanders — In fact, I can say almost all of them — are no longer with us. They’re dead,” he said. ‘Three months ago, in Operation Midnight Hammer, seven American B-2 bombers dropped fourteen 30,000-pound-each bombs on Iran’s key nuclear facility, totally obliterating everything.”

“No other country on Earth could have done what we did. No other country has the equipment to do what we did. We have the greatest weapons on Earth. We hate to use them, but we did something that for 22 years people wanted to do,” said Trump.

“With Iran’s nuclear enrichment capacity demolished, I immediately brokered an end to the 12-day war, as it’s called, between Israel and Iran, with both sides agreeing to fight no longer,” he said.

Trump said in the speech that he has settled seven conflicts since returning to office in January. Besides the Israel-Iran war, he claimed responsibility for ending the conflicts between Cambodia and Thailand, Kosovo and Serbia, Rwanda and the Congo, Pakistan and India, Egypt and Ethiopia, and Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Meanwhile, he threatened to hit Russia with “a very strong round of powerful tariffs” if Russian President Vladimir Putin does not come to the table to end the war in Ukraine.

He claimed he would “stop the bloodshed … very quickly,” but also suggested fighting would not end as long as China and European nations continue buying Russian energy.

“They’re funding the war against themselves. Who the hell ever heard of that one?” Trump said.

He accused the UN of failing to help him make peace among warring nations, saying the body was all “empty words, and empty words don’t solve wars.”

“It’s too bad that I had to do these things instead of the United Nations doing them,” said Trump.

“These are the two things I got from the United Nations: a bad escalator and a bad teleprompter,” Trump quipped, to chuckles from the audience. The teleprompter was not working at the beginning of his speech, and he said that an escalator malfunctioned in the building on his way to the General Assembly hall.

He said the US had received “no credit” for negotiating the Abraham Accords between Israel and regional states, and noted that “everyone says” he should get the Nobel Peace Prize for this and other achievements. “But for me, the real prize will be the… millions of people no longer being killed in endless and unglorious wars.”

Trump also touted his administration’s immigration crackdown and repeated his skepticism that climate change was real.

He assailed what he cast as Europe’s support for open borders, saying it was part of a “globalist migration agenda,” and said clean energy initiatives in other countries were destroying national economies.

“We’ve taken bold action to swiftly shut down uncontrolled migration. Once we started detaining and deporting everyone who crossed the border and removing illegal aliens from the United States. They simply stopped coming,” he said.

“It’s time to end the failed experiment of open borders. You have to end it now,” said Trump, addressing European nations. “Your countries are going to hell.”

He further alleged that the UN was “funding an assault on Western countries and their borders,” pointing to cash support the organization has supplied to in-need migrants. “The UN is supporting people who are illegally coming into the United States.”

Trump also urged European countries to abandon green energy initiatives, scoffing that, in decades past, some experts predicted that by the year 2000, “climate change will cause a global catastrophe.”

He said scientists predicted some nations might be “wiped off the map” by now, but insisted that’s “not happening.”

Climate change has indeed triggered rising sea levels and intensifying storms that have caused small island nations to shrink. Such phenomena have also cost enormous sums of money in disaster response, cleanup and rebuilding in the US and around the world.

Nonetheless, Trump insisted climate change was “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world in my opinion.”

He said “all of these predictions were wrong” and “made by stupid people,” adding, “If you don’t get away from this green scam, your country is going to fail.”