THE ARM OUR PILOTS NOW PETITION!
PASS THE WORD ALONG TO ALL YOU KNOW
Posted on 05/02/2002 3:54:23 PM PDT by xvb
Congress OKs Israel Support Measure
Congress clasped Israel in a warm embrace on Thursday, passing resolutions of support for the Jewish state and blessing its recent military campaign as an attempt at "dismantling the terrorist infrastructure" in Palestinian territory.
"Let every terrorist know, the American people will never abandon freedom, democracy or Israel," said Texas Rep Tom DeLay, shortly before the House voted overwhelmingly in favor of nonbinding legislation. Recent attacks directed against Israelis, the House GOP whip added, "are attacks against liberty, and all free people must recognize that Israel's fight is our fight."
"Israel has been under siege ... from a systematic and deliberate campaign of suicide and homicide attacks by terrorists," said Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., the leading sponsor of the measure that cleared the Senate. "Their essence is identical to the attacks on our country of Sept. 11," he said.
Both measures said the United States and Israel are "now engaged in a common struggle against terrorism."
But the bill that DeLay, a conservative who has been outspoken in his support of Israel in recent months, and Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., sent to the House floor was the more sharply worded of the two. It mentioned Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat by name and accused him of an "ongoing support of terror" in the wave of bombings against Israelis this spring.
The House acted on a stand-alone resolution, passing it by 352-21. Twenty-nine lawmakers voted present, several of them saying they had wanted more balanced legislation. Lieberman and Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., offered their proposal as an amendment to trade legislation. The vote was 96-2.
Lawmakers, eager to show solidarity with Israel, have long chafed at the silence the Bush administration asked of Congress at a time when American diplomats worked to stave off a wider outbreak of violence in the Middle East.
With Israeli troops ending their military operation on Wednesday, lifting a siege of Arafat's headquarters, the White House gave its grudging assent to the inevitable.
"The president understands Congress will speak its mind in a nonbinding fashion and the president will respect that," White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters.
Referring to the 535 members of Congress, he added: "The president also understands no foreign policy can have 535 secretary of states" - words that seemed to say the administration was not endorsing the measures in all their particulars.
Earlier, officials had urged Lieberman, DeLay and other key lawmakers to soften some of the language, and to insert phrases to express support for Palestinians.
Many of those requests were rejected - including a call to strip out references to "dismantling the terrorist infrastructure in the Palestinian areas." Both measures contained the phrase.
The House bill stated that Israel's recent military operations were "an effort to defend itself against the unspeakable horrors of ongoing terrorism and were aimed only at dismantling the terrorist infrastructure in the Palestinian areas, an obligation Arafat himself undertook but failed to carry out."
The House acceded to two or three requests from the White House, adding a provision that calls on the international community to "take action to alleviate the humanitarian needs of the Palestinian people."
A few lawmakers expressed concern with the legislation. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said he would have preferred to see Arafat identified by name in the Senate measure.
Sen. Ernest Hollings, D-S.C., dismissed what he said was a "simplistic, one-sided" proposal that was political in nature and not in Israel's best interests. He and Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., were the two senators to oppose the measure.
In the House, some lawmakers said a more balanced approach would have been preferable.
"Resolutions like this can very well backfire and actually hurt Israel more so than it will help," said Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas.
A steady stream of lawmakers spoke in favor of the bills in debates that unfolded simultaneously in the chambers at opposite end of the Capitol.
The resolution calls upon all parties to work toward peace, said Smith. "But it does say it without equivocation, we stand with Israel on the front line in the war against terrorism," he said.
"Israel has not asked for this war any more than we asked for ours against al-Qaida and the Taliban," Lantos told the House. "But when democracies come under terrorist attack, it is morally incumbent upon us, as the world's leading democracy, to express our solidarity. That is what this resolution does."
Today we focus on Afghanistan, but the battle is broader. Every nation has a choice to make. In this conflict, there is no neutral ground. If any government sponsors the outlaws and killers of innocents, they have become outlaws and murderers, themselves. And they will take that lonely path at their own peril.
And may we remain true to that statement and that focus and moral clarity it represents ... and may the President remain true to it ... to his own words.
I fear if we do not, it will lead to circumstances and conditions like those portrayed here:
If he does not, impeach him and replace him with someone who will. :)
WE have an "ex"-Klansman and an anti-Civil Rights governor siding with the Palestinians.
1. Why didn't they just erect and burn a cross in the Capitol while they were at it. The point would be explicit then.
2. Are either of these SOB's up for re-election?
AS for the House other than the Arab and Black members, who opposed the resolution?
DeLay's statement fails to note that the state of Israel commits terrorism against Palestinians and the Israeli occupation represents the opposite of freedom and democracy.
This measure is just another sign of the corruption of American politics by special interests.
Hollings is up in 2004, Byrd is up in 2006.
Byrd owns W. Virgina via pork spending and is unlikely to be unseated. Hollings could be more vulnerable. The techno-geeks already hate his guts because of the CBDTPA.
You mean like this? </sarcasm>
Bump off Arafat, Osama, Abdullah, Saddam, and John Doe Achmets one-through-ten-thousand.
Special interests= those who hate terrorists.
WE really could use a secretary of state for the UNITED STATES of AMERICA, instead of the current Secretary of the States of the Arab League... Colin Powell, the capitulator.
I would love to see bowell's resignation on the president's desk tomorrow AM. I have heard enough of OUR state department and OUR executive branch asking OUR ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES to TONE DOWN their speaking for the people in this WAR ON TERRORISTS.
Powell and his flying monkey, state department "lifers" are NOT elected officials. Congress is. The president is. ALL OF THEM are SERVANTS of the people... not arab oil interests.
It is interesting that the TWO senators who sided with BUSH against this positive resolute statement of our national policy towards our ally, ISRAEL in her war on terror, were two of the most repugnant incumbants in american polity... both are very very dirty dems.
Were I President Bush... I would be very wary of positions supported by the likes of these two denigrates... and Powell, if he is the one who asked congress to "tone it down" for the benefit of our arab "brothers" or whatever.
Bush needs to obey the will of the American people in this matter of our Nation's Survival... Israel's fight is OUR fight. THEY are our frontline in the middle east... the very point of democracy's spear head. WE MUST stand STEADFAST without capitulation... there are NO GOOD TERRORISTS.
Republican: 199-2
Democratic: 129-73
Independent: 1-1
Total: 329-76
Voting NO:
Abercrombie Hilliard Olver Baldwin Hinchey Payne Barrett Holt Peterson (MN) Becerra Honda Petri Bereuter Inslee Price (NC) Blumenauer Jackson (IL) Rahall Bonior Johnson, E. B. Rivers Boucher Jones (OH) Roybal-Allard Brown (OH) Kaptur Rush Capuano Kildee Sabo Clay Kilpatrick Sanders Clayton Kind (WI) Sawyer Clyburn Kleczka Serrano Condit Kucinich Snyder Conyers Lee Solis Costello Lipinski Stark DeFazio Lofgren Stenholm DeGette Lynch Taylor (MS) Delahunt McDermott Thompson (CA) Dingell McKinney Tierney Doggett Miller, George Udall (CO) Eshoo Mink Waters Farr Mollohan Watt (NC) Filner Moran (VA) Woolsey Frank Oberstar Hall (OH) Obey
Declaration of war next? I can just see the dems (with lots of backing) doing this. Lil dick is trying to take this issue away from the President.
But, I think this will hurt the Israeli's,somehow. Who on the hill is getting any real intelligence that they can make an accurate assessment of what needs said or done? I think they'll be sorry...
Wow, this is 94% and 98%!
They will be. And then we will have 100% votes. Way to go!
Looking at the no votes adn abstentions, I am noting a few Jews or nomional Jews:
Zoe Lofgren (no)
Snyder (no viote, probably Jewish.)
Ros-Lehtinen (not voting, her husband will be pissed).
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