US President Donald Trump hosted the annual Iftar dinner at the White House on Thursday as the holy month of Ramadan draws to a close. The POTUS thanked ‘hundreds of thousands’ of Muslim Americans for supporting him during the November elections and assured that his government was keeping its promises to the community.
“My administration is engaged in relentless diplomacy to forge lasting peace in the Middle East, building on the historic Abraham Accords, which everybody said would be impossible. And now we’re going to start filling them out,” he said.
The Abraham accords are a series of agreements that were signed between Israel and several Arab nations during the previous Trump presidency to normalise relations. The remarks came amid continued unrest in the Middle East due to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. The Trump administration is also facing renewed scrutiny this week after a journalist was added to a Signal group chat to plan and execute bombings in Yemen.
Trump also hailed Ramadan as a ‘season of spiritual reflection and self restraint’ during his address. He voiced hope of working with ‘Muslim friends’ to achieve a “brighter and more hopeful future”.
“Everyday during the sacred month, the Muslims fast from dawn to dusk deepening their focus on prayer and devotion to God. Then Muslims all over the world join families and friends each night and give thanks to the almighty, break their fast with Iftar dinner. We are all looking for peace for the entire world,” he added.
His remarks also contained several pointed jibes at his predecessor Joe Biden — whom Trump accused of failing to ‘fill out’ the Abraham Accords or curb the soaring price of eggs.
“When I got here…I was being hit by the fake news media. They were saying egg prices have quadrupled. I said I just got here, I didn’t even know. But the problem with eggs was Joe Biden. He let them get out of control. And as you probably saw last month, they went down 35% and the quantity is so much that I don’t know…I think they’re going to go down a lot further…we have a total of over 50% in a few weeks. Nobody wants to talk about it now,” he said.