Remarks at Middle East Peace Agreement Signing Ceremony in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt

President Trump. Thank you very much, everybody. This is a tremendous day for the world. It's a tremendous day for the Middle East. And you can see that this is probably the greatest assemblage of countries, in terms of wealth and power, maybe ever assembled. And it's just an honor being a part of it.

We're going to be signing a document that's going to spell out a lot of rules and regulations and lots of other things. And it's very comprehensive, but we've already signed documents in the Middle East and having to do with Israel and Hamas and just about everything else, and it's really working out incredibly well.

The hostages, as you know, were let go on time, on schedule. The very sad situation of bodies, which was always a sad situation—and they're being sought out, and they're working with many different people, finding some were brought in and some were not. And they're working now to find out where those bodies are. It's hard to believe that you even have to say something like that. It's so sad. It's so sad.

But what's not sad is that we have, finally, after—I guess they say 3,000 years. I've heard from 3,000 years to 500 years, but whatever it is, it's a lot. But this was the one. This was the granddaddy of them all. And frankly, I thought this was probably going to be the toughest. And maybe in many ways it was, but we had a lot of good talent.

Steve Witkoff, Jared, and Marco and Pete and General Caine were so great. John Ratcliffe was incredible. We had an amazing array of talent, and we were helped by, in particular, the countries represented at this table.

I will say, Tamim, you were fantastic, and your country is unbelievable. And I don't think they give you a fair shake. They talk about you as—though you're not a nice person, and you happen to be a nice person. You happen to live in a little tough neighborhood. You're surrounded by everybody. And without you, this wouldn't have happened. And I just want to thank you very much. That's Qatar. And thank you. He's a great gentleman, and he's an amazing—he's an amazing leader.

And another man who's been a friend of mine for a long time—I don't know what it is. I like the tough people better than I like the soft, easy ones. I don't know what the hell that is. It's a personality problem, I suspect.

But this gentleman from a place called Turkey is—has one of the most powerful armies, actually, in the world. It's much more powerful than he even lets known. If you look at some of the recent conflicts, he was at the top of them, and he was winning them, and he did win them. And he doesn't want any credits. He doesn't want anything. He just wants to be left alone. He's a tough cookie, but he's been my friend. And every time I've ever needed him, he's been there for me.

So I just want to thank President Erdoğan of Turkey. Great, great guy. When NATO has a problem with him, because he is difficult, they call me. They said: "Would you do me a favor? Could you speak to Erdoğan?" And I do, and he never fails us. Right, General? He never fails. He's amazing. So I just want to thank you for the friendship. It's great. Thank you very much.

And then, of course, we have the host tonight, and I just want to thank you very much. There was a reason we chose Egypt, because you were very helpful and—very, very helpful. Everybody wanted to have this, but we really thought it was appropriate. And you are a great leader. You have very little crime. You have problems that other countries don't have, and of course, nothing is perfect, but the job you do is amazing, and I want to thank you.

Another—he's been my friend right from the beginning, during the campaign against Crooked Hillary Clinton. Have you heard of her? [Laughter] We were both downstairs waiting to go up to meet this gentleman, who has a place called Egypt, the oldest civilization. They say 6,000 years. China is 5,000 years, but you're out—you're actually number one, 6,000 years. Can you believe it? But the oldest, they say, civilization.

But—so I went up to meet him first, and we liked each other so much that she waited for about an hour and a half, and I think your meeting lasted about 2 minutes with her. So I always remembered that, but that was our first meeting. We had great chemistry together, and he's a fantastic man and a fantastic general, by the way. But he's a great—great President. And I want to thank Egypt and all of your representatives for treating us all so well. Thank you very much.

So we're going to be signing—and we're really representative of a whole group of nations. And they're sitting behind us, and you know most of them. I can tell you, this guy's got so much money. They all have so much money. [Laughter] There's more money and power sitting behind us. I love that they're behind us. They've never been sitting behind anybody before. This is a very unique position for them.

But they are—seriously, they're among the most powerful countries in the world, the richest countries in the world, and there's never been really an assemblage like what we have today, I don't think, to my—I've never seen it anyway.

And I want to thank everybody for being with us. Here's the man. I just solved the war for him, Azerbaijan. Did I do a good job? Where's your compatriot here? Where he—there he is. You two guys are still getting along, right?

They fought for 32 years. In about 1 hour, we settled it, right? And they like each other now too. It's good. That's great. I think it's great.

Well, I want to thank everybody for being here. We have Italy. She's a very strong ruler. She's done a—doing a great job. You're doing a great job. Thank you very much.

So many—but we're actually going to be making a speech after this. So this is just a very important signing, but we're doing a signing, then we're doing a speech, and then I may stay behind with the leaders, just to talk about that—some things without the press, without the media.

But I want to thank the media for very—you've been so respectful on this deal. You know the importance of the deal, and I really—it was so pleasant to watch. I was on the plane for quite a while listening to the various newscasts, and they were all fair. They were talking about how incredible this is.

This is an incredible day for the world, let alone the Middle East. So, I just wanted to thank the media. They really treated it with respect. I wish you could be like that on other things, but that's perhaps too much to ask for. But on this, tremendous—everybody feels the same. Just tremendous respect, and we appreciate it very much.

Can we get the documents please?

[At this point, U.S. Chief of Protocol Monica Crowley delivered the documents.]

Okay.

Ambassador Crowley. You'll sign right here, Mr. President.

President Trump. Okay.

[The documents were signed.]

Okay. This took 3,000 years to get to this point. Can you believe it? And it's going to hold up too. It's going to hold up.

[Ambassador Crowley and another aide distributed the documents to President Abdelfattah Said Elsisi of Egypt, Amir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani of Qatar, and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey.]

Okay. Thank you. You can use my pen if you want. Have a pen? Want to use mine? Okay.

Okay. Okay, I think we're going to hold it up. I don't—hold up the signature page. Yes.

So we're going to go, and I'm going to say a few words. We're giving a little speech, and then we're going to meet with the leaders after that and spend a little time together without the media.

The media is invited to the speech. I just want to tell you, the people behind me and some of the people in the room that are so helpful—but the people behind me are the greatest leaders, most powerful leaders, the richest leaders, frankly. Sometimes it's not politically correct to say that, but I'll say it. The richest in the world that the world has ever seen.

And yet, when you get to know them, I know every one of them in their own way, and I can say, in particular, some—because that's the way life works—but some of the greatest people you'll ever meet and people that really care for their countries.

And why this happened is, they all came together, and they wanted to get Gaza straightened out. They wanted to get the whole thing straightened out. It got to a point where it was just crazy. And once they got together and once we started talking, it went really—to me, it went smoothly. It went so smoothly. You was such a big help. But it went so smoothly that nobody could even believe it—that we're sitting here and getting this all certified out and all done.

And everybody is happy about it. Everybody is happy about it like I have never seen before, actually. I've done other deals, and people don't care as much. Big deals. I think they are big deals, but this is something that's taken off like a rocket ship. And it did from the beginning.

And I've heard for years, this is the biggest deal. It will never happen. For years, long before I ran for office, that this is—the Middle East. It's the biggest, most complicated deal, and also it's the place that could lead to tremendous problems, like World War III. They always talked about World War III would start in the Middle East, and that's not going to happen. We don't want it to start anywhere, actually, but it's not going to happen.

So I just want to thank everybody, and I'll see you in a little while.

And, in particular, thank you all. Thank you, Tamim. Mr. General, thank you very much. Thank you very much. Great job. Great job. Thank you.

Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you.