Benjamin Netanyahu Delivers UNGA Speech to Half-Empty Room; Address Blared Over Gaza

New Delhi: Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on September 26 spoke for over 45 minutes in a largely empty United Nations General Assembly room after many delegates walked out in protest as he took the stage.

Wow!

MASSIVE walkout of diplomats at the UN as soon as Netanyahu takes the podium.

I don't recall seeing such a large walkout for quite some time at UNGA.

Israel has chosen to be a pariah and is increasingly treated as such by the international community. pic.twitter.com/sVwTKsYnE2

— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) September 26, 2025

Israel, under Netanyahu, has been responsible for a genocide in Palestine since October 7, 2023, including the starving, bombardment, attacks and killings of over 65,000 men, women and children.

At the UNGA, Netanyahu said that Israel has fought a "seven-front war against barbarism" over the past two years. He said Israel's conduct was only what "any self-respecting nation would do."

"Israel is wiping out the terror regime of Hamas and ensuring that this savagery will never threaten us again," he said. The escalation in Israel's attacks happened after Hamas, the organisation which Israel and the US call "terrorist", mounted an attack on October 7, 2023, in which Israel says over 1,000 lives were lost.

Netanyahu called the decision of France and the UK to recognise a Palestinian state something that could be "national suicide" for Israel. It's "sheer madness, it's insane and we won't do it", he said.

Netanyahu's speech, his office said, would be broadcast into the Gaza Strip as "part of the public diplomacy effort". Israel Defence Forces soldiers, according to the Haaretz newspaper, have expressed concerns over this move.

While the promise was kept, BBC reported, "But not all Gazans heard them. And for those who did, not everyone paid it any notice."

Netanyahu also thanked US president Donald Trump for his "bold and decisive action" in launching an attack on Iran earlier this year.

Trump has meanwhile told reporters outside the White House that it is "looking like we have a deal on Gaza".

"I think it's a deal that will get the hostages back, that will end the war, it's going to be peace, I think we have a deal," Trump said.

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