US President-elect Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with House Republicans at the Hyatt Regency hotel in Washington, DC, US on Nov. 13, 2024. Photo: ALLISON ROBBERT/Pool via REUTERS

US President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday said that Israel must achieve “victory” against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza before the war can end, elaborating on his views toward the conflict as the Middle East rises to the top of his agenda just six weeks out from his inauguration next month.

In Trump’s first sit-down interview since his electoral victory last month, NBC host Kristen Welker asked if the president-elect is going to “pressure” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to end the war in Gaza.

“Yeah, sure,” Trump said, shrugging. 

“I want him to end it, but you have to have a victory,” he continued, before adding that people have “forgotten” about Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel last Oct. 7, which started the war.

“People forget about Oct. 7 … I noticed that a lot of people are saying, ‘Oh, it never really happened.’ That’s like the Holocaust,” Trump said. “You know, you have Holocaust deniers. Now you have Oct. 7 deniers, and it just happened. No, Oct. 7 happened. And I’ve seen the pictures. It is — what happened is horrible.”

Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists murdered 1,200 people, wounded thousands more, and kidnapped over 250 hostages back to Gaza while perpetrating mass sexual violence during their onslaught last Oct. 7. Israel responded to the massacre with an ongoing military campaign in neighboring Hamas-ruled Gaza aimed at freeing the hostages and dismantling the terrorist group’s military and governing capabilities.

Since the onslaught, many anti-Israel activists, organizations, and lawmakers have attempted to downplay the atrocities, even alleging that widely corroborated claims of systematic sexual violence targeting Israeli women were fabricated. In some cases, others have falsely claimed that Israel, not Hamas, killed all the civilians on Oct. 7 in a “false flag” operation to justify a subsequent offensive in Gaza.

Trump’s comments came on the same day that he released a statement on the social media platform Truth Social reacting to the toppling of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime by rebel forces over the weekend.

“Assad is gone. He has fled his country. His protector, Russia, Russia, Russia, led by Vladimir Putin, was not interested in protecting him any longer,” Trump posted. “There was no reason for Russia to be there [in Syria] in the first place. They lost all interest in Syria because of Ukraine, where close to 600,000 Russian soldiers lay wounded or dead, in a war that should never have started, and could go on forever. Russia and Iran are in a weakened state right now, one because of Ukraine and a bad economy, the other because of Israel and its fighting success.”

On Saturday, Trump argued that the US should “not get involved” in Syria.

“Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!” he wrote on Truth Social.

Despite having expressed a desire during his presidential campaign to remain out of foreign military entanglements and focus on US domestic issues, Trump has found himself increasingly focused on the Middle East amid major regional developments.

Last week, Trump vowed there will be “hell to pay” in the region if Hamas does not release all of the remaining hostages in Gaza before his inauguration on Jan. 20.