Netanyahu tells the UN that Israel "must finish the job" in Gaza.

WashingtonIsraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke for the second consecutive year before a United Nations Assembly that ignored him. Most of the delegations representing the countries left the room when he took the lectern—including Spain—and many world leaders who preceded or spoke after him criticized the massacres in Gaza. Netanyahu again showed last year's maps and defiantly asserted: "We must finish the job [in Gaza]." "[Hamas] swore to repeat the atrocities of October 7, no matter how depleted its forces are. That is why Israel must finish the job. It is why we want to finish it as soon as possible," he said. A statement that hinted the difficulties on the ground that the Israeli army is facing in order to comply with the prime minister's order to control Gaza City by October 7.

The war in Gaza is about to turn two years old, and Israel has already killed more than 63,000 Palestinians, according to an incomplete count by Gaza authorities. Netanyahu promised to "finish the job" in the Strip and showed no willingness to stop the massacre; on the contrary, he has justified it by the Strip's high population density. Against all evidence, he has continued to repeat that the Israeli army is doing everything possible to avoid civilian casualties. The Israeli prime minister has denied accusations of genocide, saying that they warned the Palestinians to leave the Strip, in a logical perversion that seeks to overshadow Israel's ultimate goal: to completely occupy the Strip at any cost.

"If we wanted to commit genocide, we wouldn't tell them to leave; it's Hamas that's trying to keep them [the Palestinians] inside. [...] This charge has no basis. The comparison has no basis. The comparison to genocide, the murder of the Jews, has been made to the Nazis," Is it the Nazis? Netanyahu. The Israeli prime minister ignored the fact that during the early stages of Nazism, the displacement of Jews from Nazi Germany was an option. In Hannah Arendt's account of the Eichmann trial, the Nazi official explained that even the option of sending the Jews to Madagascar was considered. Sending them to British Palestine at the time was one of the other options. In fact, the original name the Nazis gave to their plan to commit the Holocaust was "the Final Solution," because they had previously considered other avenues.

In Washington, shortly before the Israeli prime minister spoke, US President Donald Trump assured reporters that "there will be peace" in Gaza and that he believes "there can be an agreement" to end the conflict. On Thursday evening, from the Oval Office, he had also said that he will not allow Israel to annex the West Bank, as Israeli officials have announced. "I will not allow Israel to annex the West Bank. It's time for it to end," he told reporters.

Netanyahu accused the community of having forgotten October 7. "But we haven't," said the prime minister, who read a message to the hostages still held by Hamas: "Let us not forget you for a second," he said in Hebrew. Shortly before his appearance, he had ordered his address to the UN General Assembly to be broadcast throughout the Gaza Strip via loudspeakers mounted on trucks on the Israeli side of the border. Netanyahu has vowed to continue working to free the remaining hostages. In January, when the first and only ceasefire was reached, Hamas began releasing hostages every week. The process was interrupted when Tel Aviv bombed the Strip again and violated the terms of the truce.

The Israeli leader has spoken of 20 hostages still in the hands of Hamas, his relatives have corrected him: there are 48. "Netanyahu has only read the names of the living hostages. The families of the 48 hostages are outraged by this erasure. There are 28, there were 48 . in a statement. He has criticized his intervention in the UN, assuring that every day that the war passes, the hostages are put at greater risk. "It is time to honor the will of the people, listen to President Trump's call and reach an immediate agreement that returns all 48 hostages and ends this war before it is too late," the statement concludes.

In a victim-playing narrative, in which it seems that the international community is isolating Israel without reason and not because it is horrified by the images of death and hunger coming out of the Strip, Netanyahu has also harshly criticized the recognition of the Palestinian state.""Killing Jews pays," the prime minister said, adding that this is the message Western leaders are sending by recognizing Palestine. "Here's another message to Western leaders: Israel will not allow you to put the noose of terror around our necks," he said, criticizing them for giving in to "hostile media." "We cannot defend ourselves," he said.

Against the two-state solution

"My opposition to a Palestinian state is not simply my policy or that of my government, it is the policy of the people of the State of Israel," Netanyahu said. Minutes earlier in the same speech, he had reiterated that Tel Aviv is not against a two-state solution: "We believe in a two-state solution," adding: "It is the Palestinians who do not believe in them."

During his speech, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Thursday that The Palestinian Authority was ready to take over governance of Gaza after the war and pledged to be an unarmed state. Netanyahu is now facing charges against him. "You should know that the Palestinian Authority pays terrorists to kill Jews. The more Jews kill terrorists, the more the Palestinian Authority pays," he exclaimed. And he criticized the Palestinian Authority for never fulfilling its promises of reform, because "the Palestinian Authority is corrupt to the core."

Amid the isolation that increasingly seems to weigh on him—his flight route to attend the United Nations was significantly extended to avoid the airspace of countries protected by the Rome Statute, thus avoiding detention ordered by the International Criminal Court—Netanyahu has deeply appreciated the support. Trump is not only backing him to continue the genocide in Gaza, but he was also a key ally in the confrontation with Iran. The Israeli prime minister sought to capitalize on the attack on Tehran by taking credit for it, even though it was US fighter jets that destroyed Iran's nuclear facilities. "I want to thank President Trump for his tough and decisive decision," he said.

Netanyahu once again appeared with the same maps as last year. One with the headline "The Curse," which shows Syria, Iraq, Iran, and Yemen, as well as Palestine. He crossed out each location while boasting about supposed victories.

Religious references were not as abundant as in the last Assembly speech, but they were also present. The Israeli prime minister signed off with the promise of a "future of light" for Israel: "Two years after October 7, Israel's determination and strength burn brighter than ever; with God's help, that strength and determination will lead us to a swift victory and a future of peace and prosperity."