Topline
President Donald Trump, who has long campaigned to win the Nobel Peace Prize, reshared a Truth Social post Friday morning that attacked the Norwegian Nobel Committee and accused this year’s winner, South African human rights lawyer Navi Pillay, of being an “unabashed hater of America and Israel.”
President Donald Trump was passed over for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, and he reshared a post on Truth Social that said the organization “shamed itself beyond repair.” (Photo by Kent NISHIMURA / AFP via Getty Images)
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Key Facts
Hours after losing the Nobel Peace Prize, Trump reshared a post on Truth Social that says the “Nobel Committee shamed itself beyond repair and demeaned the once great Nobel Peace Prize by giving it to the UN’s Navi Pillay.”
The post alleges Pillay, who chaired a United Nations commission that concluded Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, “celebrated terrorists and rewarded Hamas” by leading a “phony ‘investigation’ claiming to find that Israel committed genocide.”
The post touts a list of Trump’s actions, including the Abraham Accords, an agreement brokered to normalize relations between Israel and Arab states, as well as his “best efforts to end the Russia/Ukraine war” and to “stop Iran, the number one sponsor of international terrorism.”
Pillay, who learned of her win Friday morning while attending an event at the Nuremberg Court in Germany, made a quip about Trump’s Nobel ambitions to her applauding colleagues: “If you clap a little bit more, I may share this prize with Trump,” prompting laughter.
The jab follows the efforts of prior winner, Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, to share her prize with Trump, though the Norwegian Nobel Committee has said prizes cannot be transferred once awarded.
news peg
Pillay is a human rights lawyer and former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, a role in which she served from 2008 to 2014. The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced Pillay’s victory Friday morning, saying she was chosen because she has been “instrumental in ensuring that war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide are prosecuted.” The committee cited her early work defending Nelson Mandela in South Africa to her present-day work as a judge for the International Court of Justice on a case in which Myanmar is accused of genocide. Pillay chaired a United Nations commission that concluded in a report published last year that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. The Israeli Foreign Ministry swiftly condemned Pillay’s Nobel victory Friday morning, saying, “If there were an award for lies, hatred, and blood libels, Navi Pillay wouldn’t just be a contender. She’d be a frontrunner,” accusing the Nobel committee of a “grotesque weaponization of an award to legitimize anti-Israel hatred and prejudice.” Pillay, after winning the prize, dedicated the award to “all of the survivors of international crimes” and people defending international justice, “whose compassion and courage continue to ensure that impunity will not be allowed to reign.” She said political leaders “have a legal obligation to protect human rights and refrain from war.”
key background
Trump has campaigned for the Nobel Peace Prize as recently as earlier this week, telling reporters in the White House he deserves it because he “settled eight wars, and big ones,” a dubious claim he has made repeatedly. He suggested he “stopped maybe the total obliteration of the world because Iran will never have a nuclear weapon,” and said if he is not awarded the prize, “I think it would be a great discredit to them.” After losing the prize last year, he sent a scathing text to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store, saying, “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace,” adding, “The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland.” Norwegian press reported last year Trump had also called Norway’s finance minister, Jens Stoltenberg, asking about the prize. Ahead of Friday morning’s announcement, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said in a post on X Pakistan had nominated Trump for the prize, saying he “helped bring Pakistan and India back from the brink and secure a ceasefire.”
further reading
Trump’s Nobel ambitions fade, but Norway still fears his wrath (Washington Post)
Has Trump Actually Solved 9 Wars As He Claims? No—Here’s What’s True (Forbes)
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