Israeli PM Netanyahu addressing the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, October 1st.
>> Iran responds to Netanyahu: Don’t even think about attacking us
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finished addressing the United Nations General Assembly in New York City just before 1:00pm eastern time.
“Israel will not allow Iran to get nuclear weapons,” the PM said in what was one of the most important lines of the speech. “If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone. Yet in standing alone Israel will know that we are defending many, many others.”
Several times in his remarks, Netanyahu cited the Scriptures.
“The Jewish people’s odyssey through time has taught us two things: Never give up hope, always remain vigilant. Hope charts the future. Vigilance protects it,” Netanyahu told the gathered world leaders. “Today our hope for the future is challenged by a nuclear-armed Iran that seeks our destruction. But I want you to know, that wasn’t always the case. Some 2,500 years ago the great Persian king Cyrus ended the Babylonian exile of the Jewish people. He issued a famous edict in which he proclaimed the right of the Jews to return to the land of Israel and rebuild the Jewish temple in Jerusalem. That’s a Persian decree. And thus began an historic friendship between the Jews and the Persians that lasted until modern times.”
The Prime Minister closed by citing the Hebrew prophet Amos.
“In our time the Biblical prophecies are being realized,” Netanyahu noted. “As the prophet Amos said, they shall rebuild ruined cities and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards and drink their wine. They shall till gardens and eat their fruit. And I will plant them upon their soil never to be uprooted again. Ladies and gentlemen, the people of Israel have come home never to be uprooted again.”
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>> Click here to read the full text Netanyahu’s 2013 address to the UN General Assembly
- “Rouhani didn’t sound like Ahmadinejad, but when it comes to Iran’s nuclear weapons program, the only difference between them is this: Ahmadinejad was the wolf in wolf’s clothing. Rouhani is a wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Netanyahu said. “A wolf who thinks he can pull the wool over the eyes of the international community.”
- “I wish I could believe Rouhani, but I don’t — because facts are stubborn things,” Netanyahu said, adding Iran’s “savage record” contradicts Rouhani’s “soothing rhetoric.”
Excerpts (via New York Times):
- “They’ve all served that same unforgiving creed, that same unforgiving regime,” said Mr. Netanyahu, who regards Iran as Israel’s most potent enemy and its development of a nuclear weapon as an “existential threat.” He said “President Rouhani, like the presidents who came before him, is a loyal servant of the regime.”
- He said the international response to Iran’s entreaties for sanctions relief should be “distrust, dismantle and verify,” and he repeated his warnings that Israel reserved the right to preemptively strike Iran’s nuclear facilities if it deemed the Iranians were close to producing nuclear weapons
- If you want to cease Iran’s nuclear program, don’t let up the pressure. The greater the pressure, the greater the change. … Distrust, dismantle and verify.
- Rohani promises constructive engagement with other countries, yet two years ago Iranian agents tried to assassinate Saudi Arabia’s ambassador in Washington D.C. and just two weeks ago an Iranian agent was arrested in Israel for trying to plot an attack against the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv.
- Iran participates in Assad’s murder and massacre of civilians.
- Jewish history has taught us two things: Never give up hope, always remain vigilant.