His speech was also livestreamed through the private phones of Gazan residents, Netanyahu announced.
Before he began speaking, dozens of delegates a staged planned walkout, arranged by UN’s Palestinian mission, leaving the vast room half empty. A demonstration against Netanyahu also took place outside the building in Manhattan.
During his address he declared that following October 7 2023, Israel had “rebounded from its darkest day to deliver one of the most stunning military comebacks in history”.
He said: “Thanks to the resolve of our people, courage of our soldiers, and the bold decisions we took, Israel rebounded from its darkest day to deliver one of the most stunning military comebacks in history. But we’re not done yet.”
Israel, he said, will remove the “final remnants” of Hamas who are “holed up” in Gaza City and who have vowed to repeat October 7.
Holding up the same prop of Iran’s “terror axis” that he brought to his address at the UN a year ago, Netanyahu listed Israel’s military successes. Since that speech, Israel has conducted numerous military operations both in Gaza and in Iran, Syria, Yemen, Qatar, and Lebanon targeting Iran-allied proxy groups.
Netanyahu said: “Half of the Houthi leadership in Yemen, gone. Yahya Sinwar in Gaza, gone. Nasrallah in Lebanon, gone. The Assad regime in Syria, gone. Militias in Iraq, deterred, and its leaders will be gone if they attack Israel. Iran’s top military commanders and its top atomic bomb scientists, they’re gone too.”
Referencing the deployment of exploding pagers used to remotely attack Hezbollah operatives, he darkly joked: “We paged Hezbollah, and they got the message.”
And he said of Israel’s 12-day war with Iran, dubbed Operation Rising Lion, that it will “go down in the annals of military history: “We removed an existential threat to Israel; an immortal threat to the civilised world. We lifted a dark cloud that could have claimed millions and millions of lives.”
Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) at the United Nations headquarters in New York City, September 26, 2025 (Credit: Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)[Missing Credit]
Netanyahu’s speech comes three days after France became the latest Western nation, after the UK, Canada and Australia, to formally recognise a Palestinian state.
In his speech at the UN on Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron rejected the claim that recognition is a “reward” for Hamas. Instead, he said, it would “isolate” the terror group whilst encouraging reform within the Palestinian Authority.
The UK’s Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy said in his address yesterday: “What is happening in Gaza is indefensible. It is inhumane. It is utterly unjustifiable, and it must end now.”
Netanyahu, however argued that Western countries are rewarding “the worst antisemites on Earth” for unconditionally recognising a Palestinian state.
He accused many Western leaders of “buckling” under the pressure of “a biased media, radical Islamist constituencies, or antisemitic mobs.”
“For many countries, when the going got tough, you caved,” he said.
Despite their public rhetoric, Netanyahu insisted that “behind closed doors” many Western leaders privately thank Israel and say how much they value Israel’s intelligence services, which saves “countless” lives in their own countries.
Since his arrival in New York on Thursday, Netanyahu has held a flurry of meetings with world leaders, including Argentina’s Javier Milei, Paraguay’s Santiago Pena, and Serbia’s Aleksandar Vucic. He will meet US President Donald Trump at the White House on Monday.
