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“RESULTS OF CODEL TO ISRAEL” mentioning the U.S. Dept of State was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H2214-H2220 on May 8, 2002.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
RESULTS OF CODEL TO ISRAEL
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 3, 2001, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, this weekend three of my colleagues and I traveled to the State of Israel. We had several purposes for the visit. One was a show of solidarity with the Israeli people in terms of what has been going on. We visited a number of victims of terrorist acts, including American citizens, spent time with some families who had lost loved ones, children, 5-year-olds, 12-year-olds, 15-year-olds, again a number of them American citizens. We met with the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister, terrorism experts, the head of intelligence for the Israeli Army, but I think probably the most dramatic part of our visit was a review of a very small collection of arms that was captured during the recent Israeli incursion.
One thing that American television press has not given, I think, the American people any sense of is the amount and the type of weapons that the Israelis have seized over the last several weeks during their incursion. It is a staggering amount. It was an amount that if it were placed in this Chamber from floor to ceiling would more than fill this Chamber. The weapons are extensive, mortars, sniper rifles, night vision glasses, machine guns, weapons totally outlawed by the Oslo agreements.
But I have a picture here which in some ways is the most disturbing of any of the weapons, if they can be called weapons, that we saw and that have been captured in the incursion. This is a suicide or a murder belt, one of several that we saw and touched and examined. The belt itself is not a makeshift belt. It is a manufactured item. It is clearly manufactured with a certain degree of technology in the sense that it is well-sewn and PVC piping, as you can see, that is stuck inside of a vest. That was one version. There are other versions. But I think the point of looking at them and the impact is this belt and the weapons that I described, and I will show some pictures of some of the other weapons that we saw, this belt was clearly not made to be put in a museum. This belt had one purpose, and that purpose was to kill innocent people.
In fact, of the belts that we saw, had those belts not been captured, I think what is clear is that their intended use would have occurred. And if for no other reason than stopping the use of one of those murder weapons, the Israeli incursion is justified.
I mentioned the belt again because I think one of the things that the American press has not done enough of is tell this story. These are mortars found, again weapons outlawed under Oslo, weapons that have no use but offensive weapons against Israelis, found in a number of different locations throughout the West Bank, in Ramallah and Jenin, Bethlehem.
Again I am just going to go through some of these because these are pictures that have not been on American television up to this point.
Besides the weapons themselves, the ammunition, just a small sample of the ammunition from M-16s, from machine guns. In fact, one of the sickest things that we saw was a number of buckshot bullets that we were told the purpose of them, and there is evidence because of the forensic evidence of suicide or murder bombings, is that the buckshot is actually taken out and the little pellets, the ball bearings are then implanted in C-4 to make the weapons more dangerous.
Again, these are assault rifles, which also are illegal under the Oslo agreement.
These are machine guns and mortars.
These are rifles that have been modified for the most horrific use.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Hoeffel), who has taken a leadership role on this issue and shared the experience of a witness in terms of the weapons.
Mr. HOEFFEL. I thank the gentleman for yielding and want to compliment the gentleman from Florida for his leadership in standing up for Israel and the people of Israel and for helping to organize and really being the guiding light beyond the trip that four Members of Congress took to Israel this past weekend. I was pleased to join that trip led by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton) and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch) and honored to be here tonight to share some of the findings that we had.
We designed this trip, Mr. Speaker, to express our solidarity with the people of Israel and the government of Israel in the face of the war of terror that has faced the people of Israel over these last few months and even over these last few decades.
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What has happened recently has been horrible and is unacceptable, and the act of terror yesterday is a reminder of how difficult the situation is and how the people of Israel face the uncertainty every day, whether they will face this kind of terror, whether they will be able to go shopping, whether they will be able to stand at a bus stop, whether they will be able to socialize with friends and family in safety. Too many times recently the answer has been that they cannot do that safely.
We feel very strongly that the terror that has faced Israel must be firmly opposed. We heard on our trip from Prime Minister Sharon that there can be no compromise with terror. President Bush has said that there should be zero tolerance for terror. All four of us, and I am sure that the whole Congress, agrees with both of those statements from those two leaders.
I know those of us on the trip feel that there cannot be a Yasar Arafat exemption to the ``no tolerance for terror'' rule. We need to determine what we can do as a Nation to help Israel deal with this challenge and help her in her undeniable right to defend herself against acts of terror and to make sure that we do not set artificial limits or restraints upon her legitimate right of self-defense.
Mr. Speaker, let me yield back to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch). I know that he has other photographs of some of the illegal weapons that we inspected, all of which were in violation of the Oslo Agreements.
Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, before the gentleman yields back, I know the gentleman has some very strong words, and the first picture I had up was the murder belts that we reviewed. If the gentleman could just describe them in his own words, I think that is helpful to people.
Mr. HOEFFEL. Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to do so. I must say that I have never seen a more evil thing than the suicide bombing vest that we inspected as part of the seized weapons and munitions that the Palestinians have stored illegally in the West Bank. The vest that we inspected from a distance looks innocuous. It is a plain gray, down-
filled vest. Close inspection indicated that it was manufactured in China with a Western logo. It is called the Masters Company and the Masters name is on the vest, obviously intended for a Western audience. But inside the vest, a webbing has been sown and straps that are designed to hold small pieces of PCV piping, tubing; and the experts informed us that inside of those tubes, the suicide bombers place their C-4 explosives and a collection of ball bearings. So when the explosion occurs, it kills the suicide bomber, the explosive force kills and maims people around the bomber, and the ball bearings just shred the people that are in the vicinity of the bomber.
Our delegation met with a former constituent of mine who is now a resident of Israel who was the victim of one of these bombings. Her name is Gila Weiss. She was stepping onto a bus at the Jewish market in Jerusalem when a suicide bomber stepped off and the vest detonated, killing six people, wounding 40, including Gila Weiss. Now, her devastating injuries are just appalling; but the doctors are confident that she will have a recovery and hopefully regain all of her eyesight that has been threatened by this explosive blast. She is pockmarked with shrapnel marks, but they have all been removed and the doctors believe she will heal well.
The most encouraging thing about this was her spirit, Mr. Speaker. Her father, my constituent, flew over when they learned, her parents learned of her injuries and asked her in the hospital, ``Honey, do you think now it is time for you to come home?'' And this brave woman responded ``Daddy, I am home.'' And that is the spirit of confidence and resolve that our delegation found throughout Israel. It is because of that spirit that I am confident that the State of Israel will continue to exist and to thrive, and I look forward to giving my full support to that.
Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's comments.
Before I yield to our next speaker, what I would like to do is show a couple of other pictures that have not been in the American press. I talked about the weapons seized in the incursions over the last couple of weeks. There is a very dramatic incident which, unfortunately, the incident was reported, but not the scope I think accurately, and that is the ship Karine A, which Israeli commandos seized. We have read about it, but to view it and really spend at least an hour and a half looking at the weapons and understanding what they were and the actual operation was very significant.
These weapons were about $20 million worth of weapons from Iran. They were basically off the factory, off the factory, literally off the factory, bated with serial numbers and dates. First of all, 90 percent of the weapons were outside of the Oslo Agreement, maybe 95. They were weapons not for a police force, but for an army. Beyond mortars. In fact, they included rockets with explosive charges tied to those rockets. The equivalent of American TOW missiles, which are devices used to attack tanks, to be able to steer the tanks after they have been shot, sophisticated tank mines that were made out of plastic so they could not be detected by metal detectors. This is a picture of just some of the mortars. Again, if one was to fill, it would be about half of this room, the amount of weapons that were on that ship. One of the most disturbing things, and again, the Karine A incident, our Secretary of State, Colin Powell, has publicly talked about the direct connection with Chairman Arafat in terms of purchasing those weapons and being involved in the shipping of those weapons. Effectively at this point, Chairman Arafat does not deny that he tried to get the weapons in. At this point it is not a debatable point about his personal involvement in bringing in just these extensive, very extensive weapons from Iran.
But one of the other pictures which just gives us a sense of what this whole operation, the Karine A, was about, this is one of the containers that all of the weapons were in. All of the weapons on the ship were placed in some very sophisticated water-tight containers. In fact, some of the weapons were modified, some of the larger mortars, or mortar launchers were actually modified so that they could actually fit inside of those containers which are very sophisticated containers. Just a part of the sophistication, which we can see sort of on top, is there was a part of the container that actually had a balance between air pressure and water to literally place the containers at a certain depth in the Mediterranean Sea.
I mean, this is a well thought-out military action. In fact, there were buoys with each of the containers so that they could be picked up by Palestinian Authority operatives in the Mediterranean Sea. It is a sense of the scope of what the Israelis are facing.
Mr. Speaker, I yield now to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence), who I have listened to his words and I do not believe there is a Member, of the 435 Members in this Chamber, who has spoken more passionately and more effectively about the issues that America and Israel are facing in the Middle East, or who has been stronger and more forceful with his words.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I am very humbled by his words; and I am confident that they are overly generous. If anyone that might be looking in, Mr. Speaker, is paying attention at all, one would observe that Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, as we did in the resolution last week, are truly united in this institution in our belief in the preservation of the dream of Israel and our prayer for peace in the region.
I pray, Mr. Speaker, for the peace of Jerusalem almost every day. I pray for the peace not just of the Jewish people of Jerusalem, but for the Christians and the Muslims and the people who profess no particular religious beliefs. It is against that backdrop that I grieve with my colleagues today over the most recent loss of human life.
I think of the time of hope out of which we come to this place, Mr. Speaker. We come from several weeks where suicide bombings had come to an end, the efforts on the part of the Israeli military to rend asunder those who would use terrorist violence, who would use teenagers with bombs strapped around their chests as walking human weapons, targeting young families on the streets of Israel. We had seen them on the run, Mr. Speaker. We had seen evidence of the success of the Israeli military in their war on terrorism in the region.
Then we moved, with some U.S. pressure and encouragement, into a posture where the head of the Palestinian Authority was allowed to leave his compound in Ramallah just a matter of days ago, the Prime Minister of Israel comes to the United States, and against this backdrop of hope, virtually as Prime Minister Sharon sits in the Oval Office, more innocent lives are lost. Over a dozen dead, dozens injured in two separate terrorist attacks.
Appropriately, the Prime Minister of Israel ended all discussions of the peace plan that he brought to our shores and has returned to see to it that his people might not be made the subject of blackmail.
So we rise today in the latest of a series of Special Orders on this floor, Mr. Speaker, to state facts for what they truly are. Let us bring a few facts, if we can, into the record.
First and foremost, with regard to the role of the United Nations, let us understand, as Americans, as people who are committed since the inception of Israel's return to her historic homeland in 1948, that we are a nation committed to the territorial integrity and preservation of the Jewish State of Israel, that the United Nations is not similarly motivated, Mr. Speaker. That in fact, there is extraordinary evidence of a double standard by the United Nations. Why, Mr. Speaker, I would ask rhetorically do we have no fact-finding missions investigating massacres performed by Palestinian extremists? Yet, there is talk in the United Nations of an investigation into the so-called Jenin massacre, which, according to the Boston Globe, has already been determined to have virtually been a hoax. According to the Boston Globe, the Palestinian Authority's allegations are crumbling under the weight of eye witness accounts from Palestinian fighters who participated in the battle and camp residents who remained in their homes until the final hours of fighting, all told journalists that they were allowed to surrender and evacuate.
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Mr. Speaker, there has been no massacre in Jenin, and yet the United Nations continues to pursue its one-sided policies.
Fact number one: The solution lies not in the United States.
Fact number two: Let us make no mistake about it, as there are those even in our own country who would call on concessions with regard to the 13 Palestinian militants currently held within the Church of the Nativity, let us have a fact on the table, Mr. Speaker. No other country will accept these 13 Palestinian militants. Yet many in our own State Department would have Israel sit down at the table of negotiating and trust with them.
Lastly, Mr. Speaker, I truly believe that the recent attacks demonstrate that Israel's efforts in the war on terrorism are incomplete; that, sadly, because of pressure from the United States of America, it appears as though, based on the two suicide attacks of recent days, that we have asked our ally to stop a war before it was over.
So I rise today with my colleague, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch), and others who we will hear from to say that America must allow Israel to complete this operation. We must allow Israel to remove the terrorist elements from their proximity. We are in the same position. We are taking our war against terrorism to the terrorists, and Israel must be allowed to pursue the terrorists in her midst.
As I said in the beginning, Mr. Speaker, I pray for the peace of Jerusalem. I ask, as did the Psalmist, that those who love God would be secure, that there would be peace within her walls, security within her citadels. As the Psalmist goes on to write, ``For the sake of my brothers and friends, I will say, peace be within you.''
I rise today as a Christian conservative Member of this institution. I rise to speak humbly on behalf of, Mr. Speaker, millions of my brothers in the Christian faith, and sisters, who share the passion that my colleague associated with me does.
They are people who on Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night fill the pews of little buckboard churches that dot the landscape of districts just like mine in the heartland of America, and they are people who have a passion for the dream that is Israel.
So let there be no mistake to those who would observe among our colleagues and to the wider world that this is a Congress that is united across the lines of geography, across the lines of partisanship, and even across the lines of faith to come alongside our partner, our ally, and our friend in her darkest hour.
Mr. DEUTSCH. Again, Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments of the gentleman from Indiana. I really have learned a lot from the several statements he has made over the last couple of weeks.
Those of us who left to go on this trip literally left as soon as we took the vote last Thursday in support of Israel, in solidarity with Israel, but also specifically in understanding what the Israeli government is doing in terms of its military operation.
As the gentleman will recall, and as people watching might very well recall, it was a debate in this Chamber. It was an overwhelming support. Over 90 percent or about 90 percent of the Members that voted, voted in support of that effort.
I can tell the Members a couple of things. First off, we delivered copies of that resolution to victims in hospitals, to the Prime Minister, to families who had lost loved ones. I can tell Members that it meant a great deal to them that they are not alone, that there is a connection between the United States and the people of the United States and the people of Israel; that we should do as much as we can do to make that real, because unfortunately, they do feel alone.
I sat through really the entire debate last Thursday, and again, generally we do not sit through entire debates, but I wanted to hear my colleagues who were speaking against the resolution. It was a disturbing afternoon.
One of the things that we have talked about is I would welcome any of my colleagues in a discourse, because as the gentleman knows, our debates are not really debates, they are statements. They are very difficult. In this setting we can have discourse. I would hope that any of those colleagues would join us this evening and enter into a discourse about some of the statements that they made.
I would also offer to those colleagues, and we have done it before in this Chamber, an Oxford-style debate for them in a discourse way to try to defend some of those positions. Some of those positions, again, I found disturbing, shocking, and ignorant.
I will mention one, and there is no reason to mention a Member's name. One of the Members in this Chamber actually stood at this podium and put up two pictures of two young girls, a young girl who was a suicide bomber about 19 years old and a young girl who was killed by that suicide bomber.
We saw the supermarket where that incident occurred. I cannot think of many sicker, more immoral comparisons than was delivered right at this podium less than a week ago. I would ask my colleague just to share thoughts that he had during that debate, as well.
Mr. PENCE. If the gentleman will continue to yield, Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the gentleman and my other colleagues who were able to make the trip over the weekend to Israel. I am very moved, as I am sure anyone is that is watching, to hear that the pronouncements of this institution were a comfort to people who are suffering the loss of family members.
I share the gentleman's frustration with what we can only describe as the moral equivalency that many in this country and some in this institution ascribe to this conflict, to either side in this conflict. It is born, in fairness to our colleague who posted the pictures, that juxtaposition first appeared to me on the cover of a prominent American magazine. Who would ever have conceived that a sympathetic display of the photograph of a murderer and the girl she murdered would be presented on the cover of an American magazine as two victims of the conflict in the Middle East? It was an outrage to me. I have no doubt that our colleague who used that display was prompted by that same national magazine.
But it does, it seems to me, belie some of the moral confusion in the national media which has infected some in this institution. But I must tell the Members, as a friend and colleague, I was deeply heartened by what I heard in that debate, taking it in here and over the television air waves as I did in my office that day, by the way that so many of our colleagues seemed, against an avalanche of seemingly one-sided international media, to be still understanding how the hearts of the American people resonate for Israel; and, as the gentleman has said many times on this floor, about the one-to-one comparison between what Israel is doing in the West bank and what the United States is doing in the mountains of southeastern Afghanistan, and perhaps, as we speak, in northern Pakistan, that it is a one-to-one comparison. We are doing the same thing.
As our President stood at this podium days after September 11 and pronounced, ``You are either with the terrorists or you are with us,'' Israel is the one Nation on Earth, it seems to me, that has taken up the mantle and joined us in the battle against terrorism.
So I share the gentleman's frustration with many of our colleagues. I hope those that are with us listening in in their offices on this late afternoon who have a different view will join us for a colloquy of sorts.
I also want to extol the Members in both parties in this institution who were willing to rise against media criticism and distortions and stand and add their names to that resolution that the gentleman so movingly says was a comfort to families.
Mr. DEUTSCH. I would also mention, Mr. Speaker, just in terms of the discourse that occurred, on more than one occasion last Thursday people mentioned the Israeli occupation, almost inferring that it was a justification for acts of violence. Obviously, it could never be a justification for the killing of innocents. The last incident before this one that occurred was literally a 5-year-old girl was shot, murdered, hiding underneath her bed.
I think one of the facts that are important, that people should understand, is that the Israeli government offered to end the occupation. That is what the Camp David Accord was about, where the Israeli government effectively offered to give back 98 percent of the West Bank and Gaza, offered to end the occupation. So it is this demented sort of perspective that if the occupation causes frustration and violence, well, the Israeli government was willing to end the occupation, so then why did they not accept it? It ends up bringing some of those issues in.
I know the gentleman from New York (Mr. Weiner) has some very important statements, but I wanted to give the gentleman from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Mr. Hoeffel) an opportunity to talk, because he was with some of those people who we passed on that resolution to. If he could just describe the interaction, knowing that the United States Congress had passed that resolution, and literally giving it to people, if he can share in his own words.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Hoeffel).
Mr. HOEFFEL. Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to. I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.
The people we met in Israel on the trip this past weekend all knew about the resolution that the House had passed the day before. It was a remarkable demonstration to me of how much our actions here in the House are followed by the citizens and the government of Israel.
Everyone we met with, from Prime Minister Sharon, Foreign Minister Peres, Security Minister Landau, to the Mayor of Jerusalem, to Mikeli the taxicab driver, all knew and all appreciated the work that was done here last Thursday on a bipartisan basis by passing that resolution expressing solidarity with Israel and denouncing the terror.
So I thank the gentleman for the opportunity just to once more say that what happens here is followed in Israel. They appreciated the solidarity that we expressed, and there was a strong feeling of appreciation for what we did.
Mr. DEUTSCH. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Weiner), who I know over the weekend wanted to join us, but in fact had activities in his own community showing solidarity and support for the State of Israel, and has worked as hard as any Member in this Chamber for peace in the Middle East.
Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida for his statements today and for that kind compliment, and also for organizing these opportunities. We frequently in the House of Representatives are reduced to sometimes 2- or 3- or 5-minute debates on large global issues. This is now an opportunity, and it is the third or fourth time we have gathered to have kind of a reasonable discussion and back and forth about what are essentially very complex issues.
I want to also offer my thanks to the gentleman from Indiana who spoke earlier. We also have a tendency sometimes in politics, particularly in this age of conflict debate, to be overly morally certain about our position on things. Sometimes we have debates about obscure tax policy or telecommunications policy, and sometimes we go at it on the floor of this Congress as if there is no doubt in our mind with absolute certainty that our position is correct.
One thing that I would hope we would be able to agree upon is there is no moral underpinning for sending one's child out to go to a pool hall and then have them blown to bits by a suicide bomber. Those 16 young people who were killed in the latest homicide bombing, what crime did they commit? What political role did they occupy? What was it that their killing accomplished? What form of political debate is it that was being engaged in when they were blown to bits while Prime Minister Sharon was visiting here in the United States?
There is no moral justification for it. There are no political ends that they seek to get that justifies that type of horror. I would agree with what the gentleman said, the gentleman from Florida. The idea that some have embraced or even rationalized that type of activity, saying it is a function of a political discussion or a political debate, however feverishly pitched it might be, over who controls a given piece of real estate in the Middle East, these are 16 families that are going to be sitting down to dinner tonight with their young child missing from the table, blown to bits by a suicide bomber.
In that context that 350 of our colleagues, Democrats and Republicans from all parts of the country rallying last week to the cause of the U.S.'s support for Israel, and it was led, frankly, by the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Hoeffel), there are very few things we agree upon in those large numbers. But among those who argued against, there were certain myths that seem to have been repeated on this floor again and again, and in some cases they were responded to eloquently, and sometimes they were kind of left out there in the air.
One of them is the myth that somehow Israel has to just give peace a chance, that they have not sufficiently offered opportunities for peace to take hold in the area. I think, and I have said before here, we can argue that Israel has tried every strategy. They tried the couple of yards at a time, trying to get to the first down marker. They tried the Oslo process, started in 1993, step-by-step, giving and conceding more to the Palestinians in terms of control of territory.
At this time, 97 percent of the territories are under Palestinian control as a result of the Oslo process. Border checkpoints had been eased as a result of the Oslo process.
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Well, that three yards and a cloud of dust strategy was tried. What was the result? More violence; no concessions when it came to things like not teaching young people in the Palestine territories to hate Israel; to removing reference in their textbooks referring to Israel and Jews as evil entities. So the Oslo process was tried by the Israelis and rejected in large measure by the Palestinians.
Then Camp David, as the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch) mentions. That to me was kind of like the Hail Mary pass. Well, let us see what will happen if we try giving them everything they ask for. Well, that was not only rejected, but it was met with no counteroffer on the part of the Palestinians and the largest outburst of violence called the Second Intifada.
Well, what do we have left? Now we have plans to get to plans to get to plans. And those, too, Israel has embraced and the Palestinians have not. We had the Mitchell Plan, very tough for Israel, telling them to withdraw from settlements of areas that many people believe in their heart of hearts are part of Israel proper. Israel accepted the Mitchell Plan; the Palestinians refused.
Then you have the Tennant Plan to get you to the Mitchell Plan. Again, it requires very tough things of Israel. Israel said okay, we accept it. It was CIA Director Tennant here from the United States, sent on behalf of our government, who negotiated this plan. The Palestinians said no to that. We even had the Chaney Plan to get you to the Tennant Plan to get you to the Mitchell Plan. Even this level of incrementalism Israel chose to accept. The Palestinians said no because they refused to do thing one, which was to stop the violence, stop it for a period of time, allow negotiations to take place.
So the first myth that came up in the debate on the floor was that Israel needs to just give peace a chance and we in the United States need to step back, not be as supportive of Israel, because she has not. Clearly a myth.
The second myth that has emerged again and again in this debate and it has seeped into the mainstream media is that the problems there are a product of Prime Minister Sharon's intractability; that if it only was not Sharon and the way he behaves in his bellicose manner, maybe we would not have all of these problems.
Well, I would make two points about that. One is the Intifada that has started this violence, that has led to 76 suicide attacks since October of 2000, started under Prime Minister Barak. Frankly, he was in for 4 months while this violence was ratcheted up and ratcheted up and ratcheted up. No one could argue that Prime Minister Barak was so anti-
Palestinian, bellicose and confrontational. He actually lost his prime ministership because he was too generous in what he was offering the Palestinians. Yet that is conveniently ignored by opponents of Israel today who want to lay this all at the feet of Ariel Sharon, with the simplistic explanation of what is going on.
Let us not forget something else. Virtually every corner of Israeli political life today has articulated support for Prime Minister Sharon's efforts to weed out terrorism wherever it can be found, essentially has articulated support for the Bush doctrine, Israeli style. So the myth that this is a Sharon-created problem is just that, a myth.
A third myth that was repeated again and again, and I heard it last night on the news again, is that the Israelis have used excessive force on the face of the onslaught of terrorism.
We have as of this morning dropped one bomb for every member of the Taliban in Tora Bora. We have unleashed a record number of armaments in that area. We do so because we know how important it is to do whatever is necessary to root out the Taliban, to root out bin Laden and to root out his henchmen.
The Israelis have made a different decision. They are not flying over the Palestinian territories, going to Ramallah and saying there is 44 of these suicide bombers coming from Ramallah, we are going to level Ramallah. They are going house to house, down dark alleys, and making a conscious decision to increase the number of casualties.
Excessive force? If the Israelis really wanted to root this out in a way that we have done it in Tora Bora, they would do it from afar. But they will not do that. It is not the way they are as a people and it is not the way they choose to deal with the Palestinians as a people either.
So what has happened? Israelis going door to door with pictures of wanted terrorists, knocking on the door, trying to find them, and they are getting killed as a result. Far from excessive force. The exact opposite. Probably the most moral execution of a war you can possibly imagine.
And the standoff that goes on today at the Church of the Nativity. Can you imagine, just imagine for a moment, first of all, the utter contempt of the terrorists to seek refuge in such a holy place. But can you imagine any other country with 13 assassins, suicide bombers, people who have done harm, can you imagine for a moment one of the evil men that attacked my city of New York, imagine if we knew one of them was in a local church? Would we encircle it and wait and wait and wait until they came out, out of respect for that church? Probably not. No country would do that perhaps except for Israel. Why? Because Israel has been the caretaker of the religious crossroads of the world for its entire 44 years with the utmost respect. Anyone who visits Israel can attest to that.
If you look at the various places, an entire government commission was created, a government agency was created just for the purposes of protecting and ensuring the health and security of non-Jewish holy sites in the Holy Land because that is the way Israel chooses to do it. So this idea that excessive force has been used is another myth.
And the final myth, and this is the one that perhaps is a favorite of those in the media, and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch) referenced it earlier, is the notion that we have to create an environment that the moderate Arab states can help us forge. Where is this moderate Arab state? Is it Iran, who tried to export 50 tons, I believe is the number, of armaments that cannot only be used against Israeli citizens, ships and planes, but just as easily against a United States ship or plane or people? Is that our moderate friend?
How about the Saudis? The Jerry Lewis of fundraising for suicide bombers. Are they the moderates that produced 15 of the 19 suicide bombers? Are these the people that came to the United States to meet with our President of the United States and engage in a front page New York Times lecture about our moral responsibility? This is the country, this totalitarian regime that is run by a few hundred princes and potentates?
Who are these moderates? Maybe it is Syria, Hafez Assad, the new head of Syria? He is an ophthalmologist or an orthopedist or an orthodontist. I do not know what he is. He was educated at the Sorbonne so we start to say maybe he is going to be the moderate face of the Middle East. What does he do? He turns over his government in whole, in toto, to Hezbollah which continues on the other front that Israel has, their northern front, continues to use Lebanon as a launching place for more terrorism.
This is another myth that the moderate Arab states will rise up. I will tell you who is going to rise up. The people of the Palestinian territories will rise up and say what the Egyptians said, what the Jordanians have said, and what other people who have sought to make peace have said.
In every case where someone said to Israel, here is our hand of peace, there has been peace. The Egyptians decided through the heroism of Anwar Sadat, maybe we should learn to get along, live together. Peace did not take that long to do.
King Hussein of Jordan made the same decision. The moment that it comes that the Palestinian peoples choose through a nonviolent, through negotiations that they want a homeland, that they want an economy that is not in rubbles, that they want to peacefully co-exist with Israel, I can tell you that it will happen in weeks.
The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch) correctly points out the occupation is hardly even an issue any more. The Israeli people, the Israeli government say we will negotiate an end to the occupation in exchange for peaceful co-existence.
Let us not forget that in the final analysis, Israel is ringed by Arab nations who fundamentally like the idea that the Palestinian people are waging a war against Israel. They are a surrogate army. It is the Palestinian people themselves that have to make the decision. They say we no longer want leadership that turns over our faith to Hamas to go blow up children at a pool hall. We no longer want to turn over our faith to Yasir Arafat who says no to an offer of everything simply because he wants to continue to negotiate or because he does not want Israel's right to exist.
When the Palestinian people rise up and say, you know, my little 5-
year-old girl should not be seeing cartoons on Palestinian terrorism saying put down your books, put down your toys and pick up your guns, when the Palestinian people decide they are not going to go to protests, holding their 5, 6-year-old boys and girls on their shoulder with mock suicide bombs around their waists, there will be peace. Until then it is the United States supporting a peaceful country of Israel who is trying desperately to do what we have been doing since September 11; desperately trying to survive, trying to have an environment where they are not afraid to send their kids to school, not afraid to send them out for a slice of pizza, not afraid to send them out to a pool hall.
I would ask my colleagues how they would feel in their town and neighborhoods and cities all across this country if they did not feel comfortable that they could send their child out for a slice of pizza without knowing whether they would be blown up by some person wearing dynamite laced with nails, ball bearings and hexagonal nuts. That is what Israel confronts.
We in this Congress in a magnitude that is rarely seen around here, 350-some-odd votes, said we in the United States understand what Israel confronts, and we stand shoulder to shoulder with them.
Mr. DEUTSCH. The gentleman had so many incredible insights in that statement. I would like to really follow up on a couple of them.
One, the difference between Anwar Sadat and Yasser Arafat. Anwar Sadat not only came to Jerusalem as a peacemaker, but got on Egyptian television and told his people why it was in their interest to have peace with Israel, and basically led them and educated them about that.
Yasser Arafat, I am going to read this quote that he basically said today, right now. This is the quote. ``But we ask Allah to grant us martyrdom. To Jerusalem we march, martyrs by the million.''
This is the English translation from al Jazeera, but the word martyr is shaheed. And the true translation that every Palestinian understands by that word is suicide bomber. Literally suicide bomber. It is the equivalent of what we would say kamikaze, and we know what a kamikaze means. Shaheed, the Palestinians know what it means. So he said to Jerusalem we march. Suicide bombers by the millions. To Jerusalem we march. Suicide bombers by the millions.
When Yasser Arafat left his compound on May 3, it really is not martyrs in the millions, the true translation as Palestinians said the words and understand the words, suicide bombers in the millions.
This is just another comment. Let me see if I can find it.
Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, while the gentleman is looking for that, if I could ask the gentleman to yield for a moment. One of the things that is important is we frequently listen to what Mr. Arafat says to Western television in English, and then you go read what he says to his own people in Arabic, and it is a world of difference. You can hold a press conference in the United States for CNN saying this is a terrible thing that has happened, and then, as you pointed out, he turns and says in Arabic something entirely different.
Mr. DEUTSCH. This is from the New York Times, April 15. This is from Chairman Arafat's wife. And I think it is so strange to us that a mother could say this, but this is what Yasser Arafat and his wife are teaching.
``If she had a son, there would be no greater honor than to sacrifice him for the Palestinian cause. `Would you expect me or my children to be less patriotic and more eager to live than my countrymen and their father, we who are seeking martyrdom?' '' And, again, martyrdom means being a suicide bomber, a mother of a leader of a group. And I question whether or not he is a leader because one of the things that is interesting in your comments and one of the things of visiting and talking to people in Israel, is that as evil and as awful and as horrific as Yasser Arafat has been to Israelis, he has been as bad to his own people. They have indiscriminately killed Palestinians. They have destroyed an economy. There is no freedom. There is fear. The demolishment. And it is a people that does have a future. But it does not have a future with Yasser Arafat.
One of the other things, and again, the gentleman went through a number of points that I hopefully will be able to find all the corresponding charts. I think I have it.
This is our friends, the Saudis. One of the things about the Israeli incursion was that not only did they find this incredible stash of weapons, but an incredible sort of stash of documents, some of which have been released publicly at this point in time. And unfortunately, again, it is an issue where the press really has not, I think, talked about them specifically. And I welcome people trying to understand and literally read the documents.
Here is the ad that was put in a Palestinian newspaper asking for people because the Saudi committee for support of the Intifada was giving the equivalent of 5,000 American dollars per family, per suicide bomber. And literally an ad in the Palestinian newspaper, Alhayat Al Jadideh, and literally just asking them to come to a certain location for information and a number of beneficiaries and to come and sign up, prove that you are a suicide bomber and you will get $5,000 from the Saudis.
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Saudi Committee for the Support of the Intifada, which the interior minister of the Saudi government is the head of that committee.
Now, the Saudi government then sent a letter to that particular organization and the letter says, ``I remind you that the house rules of the Saudi Committee for the Support of the Intifada prohibits publication of the name of the committee.'' So they are not allowed to publicize the fact that the Saudis are paying for it.
Included in the documents are a list of suicide bombers, literally a list which people at this point is not on the Internet, but is available in the public domain, that the Saudi government pay the
$5,000 American literally to people who were suicide bombers.
So I agree with the gentleman completely. Is that moderates? Is that who we can expect? The one mistake I think in terms of the war on terrorism that the administration is making is this attempt to make something that is not. I think the proofs are the facts that the Saudis unfortunately are really not our allies in this war against global terrorism by their actions and by their specific deeds.
What I would like to do quickly in the last minutes is really just put up on the easel again some of the extensive evidence tying Chairman Arafat specifically to the terrorist actions. There has been an attempt by the President to also make a Yasar Arafat exemption to the war on terrorism, and it is a sad and, I think, tragic mistake of the administration.
The facts are the facts. The truth is the truth. These are one of several documents. At this point the Palestinian authorities are no longer inferring, as originally they did, that the documents are hoaxes. These were found by soldiers in the hard drives of Arafat's compound; and in fact, I spoke with the parents of a soldier who, in fact, was one of the soldiers that did, that was killed, and in the interim, the parents before, because it was in a different incursion, he was in Ramallah, he ended up being killed in Jenin, actually called his parents and explained to them what he did and by his own words told me what their son told him. In fact, he actually got these specific documents and the young man, 20-year-old young man, that died.
This particular document, which at this point again, there is no question about its authenticity. It is signed by Chairman Arafat, his signature, and specifically, it is a request by a senior Fatah activist in the West Bank for $2,500 for three known terrorists, terrorists that were on the Israeli's most wanted list. In fact, the Israelis were assassinated because of specific direct involvement with terrorism, and Chairman Arafat signs and approves those payments.
He does the same in this chart for a list of 12 known terrorists and again his signature, which at this point is no longer refuted in terms of his direct involvement in terms of terrorist acts.
In some ways this is one of the most disturbing documents found. It is a list of expenditures by Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a martyr group, a list of their specific needs; and as incredible as it is, we meet every week five to nine, explosive targets. The squads in the various areas, five to nine explosive charges for suicide bombs, for murder bombers, written by Al Aqsa, to the Palestinian Authority, in their office was found and the calculation of how much they were going to pay them.
It is just not credible that they were not involved in direct bombings, suicide bombings.
Here is a copy of minutes of a meeting from March 24, 2002, of the Palestinian Authority. Hamas members were there at the time. So again it is not credible to say that Chairman Arafat obviously was at this meeting, but specifically talking about minutes from the meeting, talking about the decisions of where to bomb and why it was not a good time to bomb because or where outside the green line or inside the green line. General Zinni was there.
I am going to close because our hour is just about up, and there are more things that I can mention or show, but I think that in closing Israel's war is America's war. Israel does not want to be in Bethlehem or Nablus or Jenin anymore than America wants to be in Afghanistan. They are there because they have to be there. They have no choice.
I will not show a chart of it, but Israel is about \1/60\th the size of the United States in population. When 50 Israelis are killed, it is the equivalent of 9-11. So just yesterday it was almost the equivalent of one-third of 9-11. We know how America responded on 9-11, as we should and as we did and as we are doing. We cannot ask anything less of the Israelis.
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