Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that Israel must “complete the elimination of the Iranian regime,” and that he has discussed the issue with President Donald Trump “more than once, including the day before yesterday.”

Speaking at the opening of the academic year at the new Kiryat Shmona-Tel Hai University, near the Lebanon border, Netanyahu said Israel has “changed the picture from one end to the other” in the north – pushing back Hezbollah’s Radwan force, opening a new security zone, and destroying the terror group’s infrastructure above and below ground. “I am committed to finishing the job,” he stressed.

“Finishing the job means bringing down the terrorist regime in Iran. It is the head of this poisonous octopus. You cut it off, and it will fall. We will also have peace with Lebanon,” Netanyahu said. “We must complete the elimination of the Iranian regime – that is the primary objective. I have spoken about this with President Trump more than once, including the day before yesterday.”

Netanyahu warned that as long as the Iranian regime remains in power, “even if it is battered, wounded and beaten, it is so fanatical that it will try again to do what it did a year ago, and which we stopped them from doing: producing nuclear bombs and rebuilding the ‘axis.'” “Therefore, the only way to prevent this is to bring down this regime, and then the elimination of Hezbollah will follow,” he said.

The ceremony marked the start of the first academic year at Kiryat Shmona-Tel Hai as Israel’s 11th research university, 21 years after the government decided to establish a university in the Galilee city. Nearly 5,000 students are beginning the year across its four faculties – up about 7% from last year – and roughly 20% of them served in the reserves during the war.

Netanyahu called the opening “a historic thing” and “a day of good tidings” for Kiryat Shmona and the Galilee, recalling his grandfather’s vision of Jewish settlement and steadfast endurance in the region, and urged the university to invest heavily in artificial intelligence. “This is our direction: security, transportation, higher education – it is everything,” he said.