Welcome to Ireland and welcome to Fáilte. And as I said earlier, we're very mindful of the fact that this week America in particular and the entire world has been marking the 25th anniversary of the murderous attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. And I know you gave a significant speech at the Pentagon to say we're thinking of you. We're thinking of all Americans. It had a deep impact in Ireland at the time. We had a national day of mourning in the aftermath of 9/11. Over a thousand were of Irish heritage. And we'll always remember the incredible courage, bravery, and sacrifice of the first responders, firefighters, the NYPD, Authority, people who put themselves in harm's way, sacrificed their lives to try and save the lives of their fellow citizens. And in many ways it remains inspirational to the entire world, the bravery of those American first responders. So that's something we're very conscious of. We're particularly pleased that you made it for the Irish Open. You did say to me 12 months ago that you would do everything possible to get here when it was announced that Doonbeg would be the venue for the Irish Open. And I think it illustrates the very strong sporting relationship between our two countries. And what a great year it's been for you with the World Cup, which we all watched. We didn't make it through to it, but we still watched it. All the stars were playing through the Olympics, Los Angeles coming. We had caught American college football recently, North Carolina, the Texans, etc. And you know, we have the Aric now. We have the Ryder Cup next year. So the sporting connections between our two countries were huge and the people at Doonbeg are particularly appreciative of your investment and the investment of your family. And we welcome your family here, delighted that they could make the trip. In terms of the investment in Doonbeg, 350 people in that park, West Clare, and it's a valuable, valuable asset to the area and they're particularly welcoming of it. And in many ways, I think that illustrates the strength of the economic relationship between our two countries. I know the ambassador has taken you to his residence where you'll meet hundreds of Irish business people who have investments in America who are employing American people. Over 200,000 Americans employed by Irish companies. And yes, there are American companies in Ireland who are employing about 245,000 Irish people. They get access to the European market from the base here and the Asian market and they do particularly well. So it's a very strong old relationship. I showed you the gift that you gave me or gave to the state outside, which is the Declaration of American Independence in 1776. And then you have a lovely book that you presented to me which I have on display now in government buildings with nine people, some born in Ireland, three born in Ireland and others of Irish descent. The printer was an Irish man and so on like that. And that's how long, enduring, and how deep the relationship between our two countries is. And that's why we're very pleased to welcome you to Ireland and to this house here, Farmleigh House, which I think reflects part of that as well.
Well, thank you very much. And we've been friends and we've had a great relationship right from the beginning. And I did make a promise to come over. I said, 'If I can, I'm going to do it.' Because we talked about the Irish Open is a very big event in Ireland and frankly all over the world really because it's a great golf event and you have the best players in the world right now. In fact, Shane is an Irish person named Shane. We just call him Shane is winning and he's leading and you know he's got a long way to go. Everybody's watching. Watching Rory's playing well, but he always plays well. He always plays well. You have a lot of great Irish players that are doing very well at an Irish course and it's been a tremendous success. It's rated one of the greatest courses in the world and I'm very honored to have it. I've owned it for, I built it. It's about 22 years right on the ocean. So, it's very exciting and I'll be going there later, but we do business. We've had some discussions on trade and various other things. We have a big relationship with Ireland and that'll continue stronger than ever. But it's doing, we're doing very well. The two countries do very well together with a very, we're along, but I would say it's never been as good as it is right now. So it's, thank you for hosting us and I know you're going to the Irish Open tomorrow. You spend a whole day there. All day there. And you're going to see some good golfers I can tell you. Absolutely. Looking forward to it. Thank you very much. Thank you.
When will the war in Iran end, Mr. President?
I think very soon. I think it'll be probably right after the terms. They're trying to hold out as long as they can to complicate the election, but I think people are wise to it because Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. It's very simple. This is a very simple thing. Iran cannot have, they were two weeks away from having a nuclear weapon. If they had it, they would have blown up Israel. They would have blown up the Middle East. Then they would have hit some of Europe's, in my opinion, Europe's cities and beyond cities and they would have probably hit us too before we put out the fire. But they cannot have a nuclear weapon. But I would say shortly and oil will come tumbling down when that happens. Oil prices will come tumbling down.
How's your call with MBS and what is the US willing to do?
Well, I have had a call with MBS. He's a good friend of mine and it's going to, I can just say everything's going to work out fine and dandy. It's going to be very good. So you don't get involved in these things. I have a very nice, nice, but you have your own difficulties. I wouldn't ask you. No, but no, I think it's going to, it's all working out fine. I would say shortly after they, we had a great convention. We went to Dallas, Texas. We had a midterm convention. It was never done by either party. It's probably going to become a staple. It was so successful, so beautiful, and the arenas were packed both days. And frankly, nobody expected to ever see anything like it. It felt, I think it actually felt better than the so-called original conventions. It was as good as it could get. And the Republicans had a good time. We had a good time. A lot of great people running for office. And they're sane people. You know, we're running, we're running against some major insanity, but we don't have to get into that. But major insanity, but we had a tremendous, that was a tremendous two-day period.
Mr. President, Mr. President, what would you say, Mr. President? Can we just take, Mr. President, what do you say to some people in Ireland who say the US is facilitating genocide in Gaza and also facilitating Israel around the illegal occupation of territories in the West Bank?
Well, when you say Gaza, you know, we put out the fire and we got all the hostages back. There's very little happening right now in Gaza and that's not the place that people are talking about actually now. It was all about Gaza and we got involved and we facilitated a peace of a kind. But we got all the hostages back, some dead, some living. We got them all back. They wanted, you know, it's amazing the parents of those dead hostages. They knew they were dead. They wanted their son or daughter, but mostly sons. They wanted their sons back, their babies. The mothers sent their babies. They wanted the babies back just as much as though their son was alive and we got them back. We got every one of them back. We had in the end we had 28 that were dead and we had a lot that were alive. If you go back over the, you know, three, four year period we got many people forgot, but I always said that last 30 or 40 is going to be very tough because of what happened. But we are, if you look at Gaza, there's a lot of good relationships taking place right now in Gaza. It's been quite amazing. I think we've done a great job. Jared Kushner, Steve Witkoff, the whole group, they've done a very good job with it.
