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‘We don’t seek permission to defend our country’: Snippets from President Pezeshkian’s UNGA address

Press TV – September 23, 2026

In a powerful speech to the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian held up photographs of victims of American and Israeli war crimes against Iran, firmly rejecting Washington’s terrorism accusations and declaring that the Islamic Republic can never be forced into submission through military aggression.

The address, delivered under the summit’s theme of “Rebuilding Trust,” came one day after US President Donald Trump delivered deeply provocative rhetoric against Iran in his own remarks from the same podium.

Pezeshkian systematically dismantled Western double standards, detailed the unprecedented crimes committed against Iran during the US-Israeli war of aggression, reaffirmed Iran’s nuclear rights, and issued a warning to the aggressors.

Below are snippets from his speech:

Response to US terrorism accusations

• Yesterday, the president of the United States said we are terrorists. We are the victims of terrorism.
• I come from an Iran where they assassinated our Leader, without any legal justification.
• I come from an Iran where they bombed a school. You can see these children. They bombed these children and killed them with weapons they used from America and Israel. They had committed no sin. They had committed no crime.
• Lamerd is one of Iran’s small cities. There is a sports hall there where children were exercising. America bombed it with cluster bombs that split into thousands of pieces. They martyred our scientists, our people, our women, and innocent children who had committed no sin.
• Those who are terrorists and breed terrorists call us terrorists. We only defend ourselves. We are not terrorists.

The US-Israeli assault on Iran

• Our innocent people are the target of the cowardly attacks they imposed on our country, and we defended ourselves with power. America and Israel attacked us with the latest technology and equipment, and our people stood firm. They struck, but we did not bow our heads before them. We struck back, but we did not strike civilians.
• From the territories they came from and were equipped in, they attacked our schools, our hospitals, our universities, our bridges, and our infrastructure. All of this is in violation of international law.
• When I took office, on the very first day, they assassinated [Hamas leader] Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. Israel bombs and assassinates any government, any state, any region it wishes.

Gaza: 80,000 massacred

• In Gaza, they massacred over 80,000 innocent human beings. More than 100,000 people are displaced. They are committing genocide with the tools and technology at their disposal. Then they say others are terrorists, that they are the source of instability.
• Are we the source of instability? We who want to live independently, who refuse to bow our heads- are we the source of instability?
• If those who assassinate, kill, and commit crimes are the agents of security and peace, while they observe none of the rules of international law, this is the reality we face.

Iran’s 200-year record of non-aggression

• We want nothing. We have found our answer. We need power, because a nation that cannot defend itself will be crushed.
• In this world, the powerful, instead of thinking about people, humanity, justice, and democracy, are agents of ruin, destruction, and annihilation. Whoever they want to destroy, they label a terrorist.
• For 200 years, Iran has not attacked any country. Two hundred years. We have always defended ourselves. Yet now we must be accused of being terrorists and agents of insecurity in the region.

Power for defense, energy for development

• This has led us to choose our strategy: We want power to defend ourselves. We do not want power to launch aggression. We want energy for development, not for building bombs, destruction, or threatening society. And for security, we want to participate.
• Iran must be powerful enough so that its survival and progress are not threatened, responsible enough not to use its power for domination, and far-sighted enough not to seek its security in the insecurity of its neighbors.

The people’s seven-month vigil

• Over the past seven months, our people have been in the streets every night to defend our Iran and to prevent those whom America and Israel had incited and armed from entering the country and creating internal insecurity.
• For seven months, the people of Iran have been in the streets day and night. The people are our power, and we stand with the power of the people.

Iran’s defense doctrine

• Regarding Iran’s defense, we have built our defense system so that no one imagines that bombing Iranian cities will go unanswered.
• Iran’s military power is for defense. But we say clearly: we do not ask permission from anyone to defend our country.

Neither nuclear weapons nor deprivation

• For years, they have spoken about Iran’s peaceful nuclear program in the language of centrifuges, enrichment, sanctions, and bombs. But for our people, nuclear technology is part of the right to development.
• Nuclear energy means treatment for our patients, food security for agriculture, technology for industry, and sustainable electricity for the future.
• Iran does not accept that nuclear knowledge should be the exclusive privilege of a few countries. Iran does not consider nuclear weapons a factor of security, but it will not relinquish its right to science, industry, and peaceful energy.
• We say explicitly: neither nuclear weapons nor deprivation of nuclear knowledge.
• Iran’s nuclear position cannot be resolved on the battlefield. The solution is an agreement that provides the world with credible assurance of the peaceful nature of Iran’s program and provides the Iranian people with assurance that their rights will be preserved.

The Strait of Hormuz

• In the waterway of the Strait of Hormuz, we cannot be the historical guardian of a waterway that everyone benefits from, yet be deprived of the freedom of navigation even in our own waters due to unjust sanctions.
• They close the road to us, and then they transport weapons, explosives, missiles, and energy for the destruction of countries through the same waterway. This is not possible. They cannot do this, and we will not allow such a thing to happen in our country.
• The permanent deployment of hostile fleets and the expansion of war do not bring security. The security of shipping cannot be ensured by undermining the security of coastal states.

No peace without Palestine justice

• Palestine remains a wound on the conscience of the international community, and Gaza remains the symbol of the failure of international mechanisms to prevent civilian suffering. For decades, resolutions have been issued, but occupation and violence continue.
• We cannot speak of peace while ignoring Palestine. Lasting peace in West Asia will not last without justice for Palestine.
• As long as occupation, aggression, and injustice exist in the world, resistance will continue. If one form of it is harmed, it will emerge again in another form, perhaps even stronger.
• Gaza, despite relentless killing and widespread destruction, revealed the faith of the people that resistance cannot be forced into surrender by bombs and siege.
• This is the nature of humanity. If you drive a human being from their land, they resist. If you bomb a person’s home, they resist. What should they do if they do not resist? Accept bullying? Accept being driven from their homes and sit silently? And if they want to defend themselves, call them terrorists?

Regional solutions and strategic independence

• It is clear that the issues of our region, before becoming a pretext for the war of distant powers, can be solved within the region and by the countries of the region.
• Strategic independence means that relations with no foreign power become the possibility of war against a neighbor.

Message to the aggressors

• Now, a word to all those who were responsible for the decision-making, planning, and execution of the attack on our land: Our nation has experienced their military power and the consequences of their destructive decisions up close. They have tested Iran’s resilience, and now they know well that Iran cannot be forced to surrender through war.
• Iran has never initiated any war and has always demonstrated its commitment to the negotiating table. War was imposed on us, but we proved that we do not fear war to defend ourselves; we do not flee from negotiation for peace, and we stand to the last breath for the defense of dear Iran.

International double standards

• The theme of this summit is rebuilding trust. Trust is not built with words; it requires the avoidance of double standards.
• The atomic bomb and other weapons of mass destruction in this region are in the hands of the Israeli regime, yet inspections are demanded of Iran.
• Israel massacred 70,000 people in Gaza, yet Iran was bombed at the negotiating table.
• Israel has nuclear weapons, is not a member of the NPT, has never allowed a single inspector into its territory in its entire disgraceful existence, yet is rewarded with billions of dollars in free weapons and enjoys immunity to bomb any capital it chooses.
• I repeat: the nuclear bomb is in Israel, but the inspectors are in Iran. Israel kills, but Iran is sanctioned. This is a tragedy; if you tell this to anyone, they will laugh. It kills, and we are sanctioned. And sanctions target the poor, the sick, and innocent people.
• Human rights are not a tool for geopolitical competition. Iran does not seek special privileges; it demands equal rights and accepts its responsibilities.

A warning against the law of the jungle

• Iran has learned one truth clearly in its long history: the world without power is dangerous, but a world that only understands the language of power will not have sustainable security.
• If international law is only enforced when it aligns with the interests of the powerful, more countries will conclude that they must rely solely on their own power to ensure their security, and this will mark the beginning of a far more dangerous world for all of us.
• We must not allow the 21st century to become an era of returning to the politics of the strong and the rule of tyrants. We must not build a world in which military power replaces legitimacy, sanctions replace diplomacy, assassination replaces politics, and war replaces dialogue.

Iran’s call to the world

• Iran extends a hand of cooperation to the world. We call the world not to another war, but to peace and justice, not out of weakness, but out of confidence in our own power and the understanding that no one in this region will have security alone.
• Either we will build security together, or we will endure insecurity together.
• We think of building a future in which security, justice, and human dignity are inalienable and shared rights for all nations. A future in which no nation is marginalized, no voice is lost in the noise of power, and no power has the right to determine the future of others on their behalf.
• An order worthy of the international system must be based on equality of nations, justice, fairness, and the shared will of humanity. Because peace that is not for everyone is not peace, and justice that excludes everyone is not justice.

Final message to Trump

• And finally, the remarks of the US president yesterday, before world public opinion, thinkers, politicians, and jurists, are a clear sign of bullying, the logic of force, and contrary to the explicit text of the UN Charter.
• Let him know that threats make our nation more united and stronger, and increase the resistance of Iranians. They must know that the nation of Iran will not bow its head before force, and it will make the aggressors regret it. This is what Trump and those who want to bully must understand.
• We are ready for dialogue, but let them know that we will not accept the language of force.

September 23, 2026 - Posted by aletho | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | Israel, Middle East, United States, Zionism