Trump Says The Middle East Is ‘Very Lucky’ That He’s President

President Donald Trump boasted that the Middle East is “very lucky” that he’s president after the US and Israel joined forces to wage an ongoing attack on Iran.

The commander in chief made the comment at the Republican Issues Conference on Monday after remarking that the US has “already won in many ways” in Iran, but hasn’t “won enough” — a comment a reporter later asked Trump to clarify.

“What do you consider enough? What’s your baseline?” the reporter asked Trump, prompting his lengthy, scattered response. 

“Where they’re not going to be starting the following day to develop a nuclear weapon,” Trump began. “Where they’ll look at that man and some other people from the administration and say, ‘All right, we’re not going to do it.’ They were not willing to say that. And when Steve called up and he said that to me, I said, ‘Well, here we go. Let’s do it the hard way.’”

The president was probably referring to Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy to the Middle East. 

“But the hard way, I think, is probably the easy way,” Trump continued. “When basically I can see that they will no longer have any capacity whatsoever for a very long period of time of developing weaponry that could be used against the United States, Israel or any of our allies. We have great allies in the Middle East, great countries that are allies. And they were staying out of it until they got hit.” 

Trump also claimed that if he didn’t “hit” Iran first, “they were going to hit our allies first” and that “they were going to take over the Middle East.” 

“Now, had Operation Midnight Hammer not taken place? That was definite, because they would have had a nuclear weapon within a matter of weeks,” he said. “But that took place. That was a setback. But look at the number of missiles they were able to buy and make over the last six months. And those missiles were aimed at various countries.” 

Operation Midnight Hammer was a US military strike on June 22, 2025 that targeted Iranian nuclear facilities. 

Wrapping up his response, Trump appeared to disparage former President Joe Biden by claiming that the Middle East was “very lucky” that he’s president, “instead of somebody else,” amid the conflict with Iran.

“And when you look at a thousand — over a thousand missiles shot at, like, UAE — they were looking to take over the Middle East,” he added. “We got there first. We’re lucky. I’ll tell you what, the Middle East and those countries, very rich countries, are very lucky that I was president instead of somebody else.” 

Since the Trump administration and Israel attacked Iran on February 28, the  deadly conflict has sparked widespread backlash even from Trump’s supporters.

Watch Trump’s press conference below. Skip to the 28:45 mark to hear the president’s remarks.