Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations on Monday, where he warned of persisting threats from Hamas and the Islamic State - "branches of the same poisonous tree" with world domination through terror as their modus operandi.
Along with ISIS and Hamas, Netanyahu said al-Qaida, Nigeria's Boko Haram, Somalia's al-Shabab, and Lebanon's Hezbollah all share the same goals of "imposing militant Islam on the world," reported the Associated Press. He then compared them to "another fanatic ideology that swept into power eight decades ago": Nazism.
"We must remove this cancer before it's too late," he said.
United States State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki refuted the claim that ISIS and Hamas are the same, saying, "we obviously believe that ISIS poses a different threat to the United States."
Speaking at the U.N. General Assembly's annual ministerial meeting, Netanyahu proclaimed that the greatest threat to the world, however, is not ISIS, Hamas or al-Qaeda; according to him, it's the possibility of Iran obtaining nuclear weapons.
"It's one thing to confront militant Islamists on pickup trucks, armed with Kalashnikov rifles. It's another thing to confront militant Islamists armed with weapons of mass destruction," he said.
Warnings from Netanyahu claiming Iran is close to obtaining nuclear weapons date back to 1992, when he predicted the country was five or six years away from becoming a nuclear state.
Netanyahu also criticized various efforts underway by six world powers aimed at reaching nuclear deals with Iran, reported the Associated Press. "To defeat ISIS and leave Iran as a threshold nuclear power is to win the battle and lose the war."
When speaking how how he believes the U.N. Human Right Council treats Israel, Netanyahu claimed that one of the world's oldest prejudices, anti-Semitism, has returned and is "now spreading in polite society, where it masquerades as legitimate criticism of Israel."
Netanyahu, reflecting on how the U.N council is continuously singling out Israel despite many other atrocious acts being committed around the world, called the council a "terrorist rights council."
Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization's executive committee, said Netanyahu's speech blatantly manipulated the facts and was aimed at misleading world leaders "through a combination of hate language, slander and argument of obfuscation," reported the Associated Press.
