[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 142 (Wednesday, September 30, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H6714-H6715]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      UNWAVERING BOND WITH ISRAEL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
Florida (Ms. Ros-Lehtinen) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Mr. Speaker, this morning, the United Nations will 
take yet another action that only serves to further undermine the 
prospects for peace between Israelis and Palestinians and underscores 
the lengths to which the United Nations and many of its member states 
will go in order to wrongly isolate and delegitimize the democratic 
Jewish State of Israel.
  By raising the Palestinian flag for the first time ever at the U.N., 
that body is allowing Palestinians to continue with their scheme to 
achieve unilateral statehood without having to honor their obligations 
to reach a peaceful settlement through direct negotiations with Israel.
  While addressing the U.N. General Assembly this week, President Obama 
had an opportunity to denounce this latest stunt and press for the 
United Nations to abandon its course of action and return to the 
principles of its own diplomatic agreements with regard to resolving 
the peace process; yet, as usual, the President remained silent. That 
silence speaks volumes about the administration's policy toward Israel, 
our closest friend and ally, and it will surely only serve to embolden 
Abu Mazen. Today, Abu Mazen will address the U.N. General Assembly, and 
his speech will be nothing more than political theater.
  In his speech later today, Abu Mazen will surely continue his ploy to 
achieve unilateral statehood recognition from sympathetic states and 
U.N. entities that are dominated by anti-Israel bias, like the Human 
Rights Council. What a misnomer. And, of course, he will blame Israel 
for not being able to achieve peace, when it is Abu Mazen who 
repeatedly has rebuffed overtures from Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu 
to return to the table to discuss a mutually agreeable resolution.
  Mr. Speaker, we have seen over the past several years--a sight 
unseemly and unbecoming--the administration publicly admonish and 
insult our ally Israel and its leaders, applying a false moral 
equivalency between Israel and the Palestinians; yet when it comes to 
Abu Mazen's intransigence or Palestinian incitement, the Obama 
administration remains reserved in its condemnation, if it feigns the 
appearance of disapproval at all.
  For peace, Abu Mazen must recognize Israel's right to exist as a 
Jewish state, must renounce the use of violence and put an end to the 
repeated rocket attacks and acts of terror, and must sit down with 
Israel to be an earnest partner for peace.
  Abu Mazen, who is currently in his 10th year of a 5-year term as the 
leader of the Palestinian Authority, is only interested in self-
preservation and self-interest. The onus lies with Abu Mazen and the 
Palestinian Authority to live up to their obligations and previous 
diplomatic agreements. If and when it doesn't--for surely, I know that 
they won't--the U.S. must be ready to cut off financial assistance to 
the Palestinians.
  We must see that our assistance is used as leverage to ensure that 
the Palestinians honor their commitments and negotiate a peaceful two-
state solution directly with Israel without any preconditions. We must 
also veto any attempts by the Palestinians to bring another resolution 
to the U.N. Security Council to advance their illegal unilateral 
statehood scheme and must make Abu Mazen pay for the consequences of 
these destructive actions.
  The Obama administration will offer platitudes, and the 
administration officials will say that no other President has done more 
for Israel's security. But I caution that it isn't what the 
administration or the President says regarding Israel; it is what they 
don't say that we should also be paying attention to. That is why the 
President's silence on Israel and the Palestinians at the U.N. General 
Assembly this week is all too telling, and that is why it is up to us 
in Congress to do what we can to support Israel, to support the Jewish 
state's right to exist and its right to defend herself, and to use the 
leverage we have.
  Ladies and gentlemen, nearly $10 billion in U.S. taxpayer dollars, 
your

[[Page H6715]]

money, is being sent to the U.N. We must use that leverage at the U.N. 
to hold those entities accountable and to fight back this fraudulent 
unilateral statehood scheme and these efforts to delegitimize Israel.
  We need to make every effort we can to signal to the world that our 
commitment is an unbreakable bond between the U.S. and the democratic 
Jewish state and that that bond is unwavering.

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