Iran was something that I was against the deal from the first day I heard about it. I thought it was a horror show. It should never have happened. It was Obama - President Obama. But the Congress was certainly complicit because they could have stopped it. It got done. They actually became worse; they became more hostile. You would've thought - I always said, "They should thank us profusely for what we did." We gave them $150 billion. Even crazier sounding to me is that we gave them $1.8 billion in cash. If anybody knows what $1.8 billion in cash looks like, I'm still trying to figure it out. They took the money out of banks from three major states and they didn't have enough, so they ended using banks from other countries to get them the money. It was the craziest deal.
And, I said, if I get in, I'm going to consider, after studying it, terminating the deal. I had a Secretary of State that didn't like terminating it. I played the game for a while; I wish I did it sooner. But I played that little game for a while, and then ultimately I decided I'm just doing it. And I did it.
And it's had a tremendously positive impact on, I think really, world security - because Iran is no longer the same country. From the day I did it, they've lost their mojo. And I will tell you that if you look at Iran now, when I - if you go a day before I took over - I don't want to say the same day - the day before I took over as President, Iran - it was not a question of how big and how strong they were; it was a question of when will they take over the entire Middle East. And that probably includes Israel, in the mind of a lot of people.
And if you look at them today, they're not looking at the Mediterranean any longer. They're not looking at places that they were going to routinely take over. And I think Israel feels a lot safer than they've felt in many, many years.
Iran is fighting for their own survival. They've got demonstrations in every city. This is far worse than it was years ago when President Obama could've maybe crushed Iran if all they needed was a positive statement - the people that were demonstrating. Well, these demonstrations are larger, but they're more widespread. They're all over the country.
So Iran is no longer the same country. I would imagine that they'll be calling in the not-too-distant future to try and make a deal. If we can make a real deal, we'll do it. If they don't call, that's okay too. Eventually, they're going to have no choice. But we'll see what happens.
I can only say from the standpoint of Israel, what I did was a great thing for Israel. And what I did was also a very good thing for world peace, because everywhere we went - especially in the Middle East - where there was a problem, Iran stood behind that problem.
So I cancelled the deal. I terminated the deal, like I said I would during the campaign. It turned out to have a much bigger impact than I thought. I did it primarily because of nuclear, but I knew it wouldn't be great for their economy. I had no idea how devastating it would be.
As you know also, now the Europeans are finally leaving. They're finally saying,
"All right, look, this is just not working." You know, they tried to play hardball for a little while but they're now leaving and they're doing the right thing. And the relationships I have with them are very good.
But it's had a huge impact, Norm, on the country. And they are now really looking to survive and to - I can't use the word "prosper" because that's not the right word - but they are certainly looking to survive. And we'll see what happens down the road. But that is not the same country that was in existence when I took over as President of the United States.
Thank you, Norm.
MR. COLEMAN: And, Mr. President, we thank you for your courage and wisdom and the impact - positive effects it's had on the U.S.-Israel relationship.
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, Norm, very much. Thank you.
MR. KUSHNER: Thank you everybody for taking the time to do this. Best wishes to all of you for Shana Tovah, and happy and healthy New Year. And we look forward to seeing a lot of you soon. All the best.
