[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 182 (Thursday, November 16, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S17179-S17180]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                IN HONOR OF PRIME MINISTER YITZHAK RABIN

  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, on October 25, 1995, the Prime Minister 
of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin, spoke in the Capitol Rotunda at a ceremony 
commemorating the 3,000th anniversary of the founding of the City of 
Jerusalem by David. I had the honor to introduce him. I ask unanimous 
consent to have printed in the Record my remarks on that occasion.
  There being no objection, the remarks were ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

               Remarks of Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan

       My pleasant and most appropriate task this afternoon is to 
     introduce one of Jerusalem's most illustrious sons.
       History will acknowledge him as the unifier of the City of 
     David--the Chief of Staff whose armies breached the barbed 
     wire and removed the cinder blocks that has sundered the city 
     of peace.
       History will honor him as the magnanimous leader of a brave 
     people--brave enough to fight against daunting odds--perhaps 
     even braver still to make peace.
       History will remember him as the last of the generation of 
     founders--the intrepid children of a two thousand year dream. 
     Almost certainly, the last Israeli Prime Minister to play a 
     leading role in the War for Independence, he was also the 
     first --and to this day the only--Prime Minister to be born 
     in the Holy Land.
       He is a proud son of Jerusalem. As a young man he dreamed 
     of a career as an engineer. But destiny had other plans and 
     he fought and led for almost half a century so that his 
     people could live in peace and security.
       Nobel Laureate, statesman, military hero, friend of our 
     nation where he served with distinction as an ambassador in 
     this very city, he honors us today by joining us in our 
     festivities--the Prime Minister of Israel, the Honorable 
     Yitzhak Rabin.

  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, twelve days later, I, along with many 
Senate and House colleagues, stood by his casket, first at the Knesset, 
later on Mount Herzl where he was buried. It was an experience none of 
us will forget. No one has captured the moment and the momentous 
consequences better than Mortimer B. Zuckerman, who 

[[Page S 17180]]
was there also. I ask unanimous consent that his reflections, ``The 
Light of a Fierce Fire,'' be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

           [From the U.S. News & World Report, Nov. 20, 1995]

                       The Light of a Fierce Fire

                       (By Mortimer B. Zuckerman)

       The poet was once asked, ``If your house was burning and 
     you could save only one thing, what would you save?'' The 
     poet answered, ``I would save the fire, for without the fire 
     we are nothing.''
       It was Yitzhak Rabin's destiny not to be saved from the 
     frenzy of a madman. But bullets cannot so easily extinguish 
     what Rabin's bravery and vision ignited, the fire of Israel's 
     commitment to peace. He might so easily have died in the din 
     of battle, this man who made war when he had to. But he died 
     instead amid the clamor of peace, with the acclaim of a mass 
     peace rally of Iraelis still in the air and still in his 
     mind. It would be his last wish that the flame of peace, for 
     which he gave his life, should not be dimmed by anger and 
     despair. His state funeral, for all its sadness, was 
     inspiring as an occasion for the vindication of his hopes, 
     for a new dedication to Israel's security from America and 
     for a demonstration of goodwill by some former Arab enemies.
       President Clinton led a bipartisan delegation that included 
     the congressional Republican leadership, former President 
     Bush and former Secretary of State George Shultz. It was more 
     than a respectful gesture of protocol. This was a statement 
     of emotional and psychological support from the most powerful 
     nation in the world to a small, isolated country, living in a 
     perilous neighborhood and in a time of great national trauma: 
     We do more than share your grief, we understand your fears; 
     and we will not desert you as you have so many times in your 
     history been deserted. All Americans could take pride in 
     President Clinton's splendid eulogy; in the uniqueness of 
     America's compassion and friendship that extended beyond a 
     calculation of narrow national interest; in the honor of the 
     hand outstretched at a time of need to an ally and friend. 
     The president rose to the moment. The hundreds of thousands 
     of people who lined the roadside and saw the American 
     delegation were clearly moved.
       Of equal significance was the roll call of certain Arab 
     countries (excluding Saudi Arabia) and especially the 
     emotional speech of King Hussein of Jordan. His words 
     referring to Yitzhak and Leah Rabin as ``my brother'' and 
     ``my sister,'' which Muslims usually reserve for one another, 
     and the tears shed by both the king and his queen, made a 
     deep impression on the Israelis for their humanity and 
     ability to overcome the past. Here, clearly, were keepers of 
     Rabin's flame of peace, continuing a line that began with 
     Egypt's late president Anwar Sadat.
       It is hard for outsiders to appreciate the effect on 
     Israelis of the worldwide outpouring of sympathy and 
     condolence, with some 80 nations represented at the funeral. 
     The Israelis are a traumatized people. They have for so long 
     been alone, so long believed they could not rely on anyone 
     but themselves, so long expected the world to stay silent in 
     their times of trouble. The extensive response resonates for 
     a people who remember how the world closed its doors to 
     millions of Jews in the 1930s. Their deaths in the Holocaust 
     were but an obscene multiple of the deaths endured in the 
     crusades and programs of earlier centuries when the Jews were 
     betrayed by those who had the power to save them.
       Israel was to be the end of that vulnerable status of 
     perpetual minority, an end to exile and alienation, and a 
     beginning of a normal and natural form of national existence. 
     Israel was home, the new home in the old country, proclaiming 
     that the Jews had formed a self-reliant community and did not 
     need others to fight their battles for them. Now they had 
     their future defined by their own family; the farmer, the 
     kibbutznik, the jet pilot, the shopkeeper, the schoolteacher 
     could coalesce with a traditional language, with their own 
     bible, their own culture. This self-reliance is a matter of 
     great pride. Jews could look after their own family. When the 
     Jews were kidnapped in Entebbe, Uganda, it was the Israelis 
     who took care of it. A Jewish majority could eliminate Jewish 
     vulnerability, and with their own state, the Israelis could, 
     they thought, be like all other nations and like everyone 
     else. The passion for wanting to be normal extended to the 
     notion that to be accepted, Jews did not have to justify 
     themselves by winning the Moral Man of the Year Award every 
     year--at the cost of their own survival. To be 10 percent 
     more moral than other nations would make them a light unto 
     the world; if they were expected to be 50 percent more moral, 
     they would be dead.
       And yet Israel cannot be just another secular country. This 
     very land forces the Jews into a dialogue with their 
     religious past. The land was defined through religion, 
     through the divine promise to Abraham, the covenant with the 
     Father and the covenant with the people of Israel. For many 
     religious Zionists, the victory of the Six-Day War, and the 
     subsequent opening to resettlement of the greater land of 
     Israel, were clear signs that God was guiding the secular 
     Zionist revolution toward the ultimate realization of the 
     prophetic vision of history. That is why, for some religious 
     Jews, admitting the existence of a Palestinian nation whose 
     homeland is the Holy Land is tantamount to violating the 
     integrity of the Jewish people's covenantal identity. But the 
     Jews faced a dilemma. They had come home to find peace and 
     safety, only to find that their neighbors also claimed this 
     tiny piece of land as their home. Even worse, how do you 
     share a home with someone who says: ``You have no right to be 
     here?''
       It is the great contribution of Yitzhak Rabin that has 
     brought a moral answer to this dilemma. There are those 
     Israelis who emphasize self-reliance and remember Rabbi 
     Hillel's saying, ``If I am not for myself, who is for me?'' 
     Rabin understood Rabbi Hillel had a second part: ``When I am 
     for myself, what am I?'' He saw that the Jews could not 
     control 2 million Arabs without frequent resort to a violence 
     that would erode the moral and Jewish character of the state 
     and, with that, its support in the world. He sought a new 
     definition of Israeli strength and normalcy that incorporated 
     not just military power but also moral and economic 
     fortitude. He decided to end the Israeli occupation of 
     Palestine and any pretense that Israel cold become a 
     binational state in which one people ruled another.
       He was uniquely qualified for this adventure. Those to his 
     political right had the strength but not the will to take a 
     calculated risk for peace. Those to his political left had 
     the will but not the strength. He alone, at the time, had the 
     capacity to persuade the divided and wary Israelis to accept 
     a compromise arrangement with the Palestine Liberation 
     Organization that held great promise for peace but also great 
     risk. But the risk was seen as a risk from the Arabs, not the 
     risk of Jew killing Jew. What the right-wing fanatics were 
     blind to is that their murderous intransigence threatened the 
     state that gave them succor and its necessary acceptance by 
     the world. Without the flame of peace, they would have 
     nothing but bloodshed threatening every Israeli's personal 
     security.
       The debate over security in Israel is different from the 
     quarrel with the extremists. Many moderate people all across 
     Israel are concerned about giving up land, because for years 
     their leaders told them this land was essential to their 
     national security. In Israel, security decisions are made in 
     the context of the terrible reality that a single Israeli 
     strategic blunder may mean not only military defeat but a 
     genocidal threat to the very existence of the state--one that 
     the world could not forestall, even if it were willing to. 
     Many Israelis ask: Will the peace process be the beginning of 
     a new future or the beginning of the end?
       The Israelis are determined to avoid another genocide, this 
     time in Israel. The decision to exchange lawfully captured 
     territory for the promise of peace from those who have 
     constantly threatened violence is fraught with unprecedented 
     risk. Israel will not survive in this neighborhood by 
     superior morality in the absence of superior real strength. 
     Arab moderation is in direct proportion to Israeli strength. 
     If the Arabs could defeat Israel, who could doubt that sooner 
     or later they would try?
       Can Shimon Peres, a durable politician less trusted by 
     Israelis, lead the people in pursuit of Rabin's twin goals of 
     peace and security? He is a consummate international diplomat 
     and served with great distinction as prime minister a decade 
     ago. His ardent desire for peace may be part of his problem, 
     for many people believe he is too eager to cut a deal, too 
     dovish and not skeptical enough about security issues, too 
     wrapped up in his own ambitions. So his challenge is to 
     relieve the worries of Israelis as well as meet the needs of 
     the Palestinians.
       In this effort, American support is crucial. Rabin said he 
     was elected to take risks for peace. President Clinton said, 
     ``If that is your goal, I will do my best to minimize the 
     risks you must take.'' That is the fire of friendship and 
     support that will enable Israel to fulfill what Rabin so 
     bravely began.

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