UN General Assembly
2018

Three years ago, a few weeks after the nuclear deal was completed, I asked this question from this very podium: does anyone seriously believe that flooding Iran’s radical theocracy with weapons and cash will curb its appetite for aggression? But many of the deal’s supporters believed just that. They believed that Iran’s regime would become more moderate, more peaceful. They believed that Iran would use the billions of dollars it received in sanctions relief to improve the lives of its people — solving the water problem, the trucking problem, the electricity problem and improving hospitals and schools. That is what they believed. Perhaps some people here today also believed that. Well, it did not happen. Instead, Iran used the money to fuel its vast war machine. Just this past year, Iran has attacked Kurds in Iraq, slaughtered Sunnis in Syria, armed Hizbullah in Lebanon, financed Hamas in Gaza, fired missiles into Saudi Arabia and threatened the freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz and the Strait of Bab El-Mandeb. That is some peace, some moderation.