TEHRAN – Many have long argued that the Nobel Peace Prize has become a tool of the West, used to encourage dissident figures capable of replacing governments at odds with the West.
That’s why it came as no great surprise when the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Venezuelan rebel leader Maria Colina Machado, following similar awards to rebels in Iran, Russia and Belarus the previous year. “Good day for fascism, good day for Zionism, bad day for peace,” former MEP Mick Wallace wrote in X in response to the EU president’s congratulatory message to Machado.
Norway’s Nobel Committee said Machado was awarded the award for his “fight against authoritarianism.” By “dictatorship” he meant the democratically elected government of Nicolas Maduro, which maintains close ties with America’s traditional adversaries such as Iran, China, and Russia.
After receiving the award, Machado offered to dedicate the award to President Donald Trump. “I dedicate this award to the suffering people of Venezuela and to President Trump for his unwavering support of our cause!” she wrote in English.
President Trump has been trying to draw attention to the Nobel Prize since his first term. Over the past few months, he has repeatedly said he deserves the award, claiming he ended several wars during his second term. But most of his declarations on ending wars, such as the Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict and the Pakistan-India conflict, have been ignored or frowned upon by countries.
Trump was Machado’s rival in the Nobel Prize bid, but a key player in her dream of overthrowing Venezuela’s government and taking control. She spoke with Trump by phone after dedicating the award to him. “An actual Nobel Prize winner called me today and said, ‘I accept this award in your honor, because you truly deserve it,'” President Trump said in a speech Friday night.
There are reports that the Trump administration is preparing a full or partial military invasion of Venezuela.
A “peace” advocate who wishes his own people dead and builds friendly relations with war criminals.
Machado has publicly supported President Trump’s plans for a military invasion of Venezuela and supported the recent killing of Venezuelans by the U.S. Navy in the Caribbean. It has been revealed that a Venezuelan rebel figure also sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been convicted of war crimes, asking for his cooperation in an invasion of his country. In an apparent attempt to leverage Netanyahu’s influence, given the power of the Israel lobby in the White House, she has promised to cut ties with Iran (which has forged close ties with Venezuela in recent years) and move the Venezuelan embassy to occupied Al-Quds upon replacing Maduro. In her attempt to appease Israelis, she also supports genocide in Gaza.
After the announcement of Machado’s Nobel Prize win, many speculated that it was simply a reward for standing up against a government hated by the West, but her subsequent efforts and resurfaced views remained quite topical on social media. “How does the Nobel Committee define peace?” asked one X user, in a post that has received more than 220,000 views and tens of thousands of likes.
The awarding of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize to a man who supported genocide and advocated harm to his own people has sparked widespread distrust in the past 48 hours, but in fact such views are consistent among opposition figures who have won the prize.
For example, 2023 winner Narges Mohammadi has long defended crippling sanctions against Iran and refused to condemn the U.S. and Israeli attacks that killed more than 1,000 Iranians in June. Similarly, Shirin Ebadi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for his work on democracy and human rights, is an Iranian laureate who, like Machado, has supported anti-Iranian sanctions and military action against his country.