[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 184 (Tuesday, November 7, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5390-S5391]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                                 Israel

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, 1 month ago today, Hamas launched its 
unprovoked attack on the State of Israel, on innocent men, women, and 
children, civilians all. Hamas entered the country by land, air, and 
sea, and they brutally murdered more than 1,400 Israelis. They also 
took hundreds of hostages, some of whom were American citizens. They 
abused and assaulted innocent civilians and left a trail of devastation 
in their wake.
  In the face of Hamas's barbaric attack, Israel has done what any 
country would do and defended its citizens and its sovereignty, and it 
has every right to do so. This basic truth has somehow become a point 
of confusion in some circles, but we should not be confused.
  Many on the far left--including at least one Member of the House of 
Representatives--have pointed to Israel's defense as an example of what 
she calls genocide. They act as though Israel was the aggressor here, 
not Hamas. They called on the President to speak out against the 
actions of the victim, not the aggressor. It is as though they think 
Israel is somehow the moral equivalent of the terrorist group Hamas.
  It is especially disturbing to see this rhetoric spreading on social 
media because many people who were not familiar with the facts, the 
circumstances, and the history of Hamas and Israel, Iran, and 
Hezbollah--they may actually believe the disinformation and propaganda 
they see on social media. It is also very deeply disturbing to see how 
it is absorbed and embraced by many college campuses, and it is 
downright disturbing, of course, to see it repeated here in the Halls 
of Congress.
  There should be no confusion. Hamas is the aggressor, and Hamas bears 
ultimate responsibility for the pain and suffering in Israel and in 
Gaza. Hamas's own tactics are the very reason for the loss of life in 
Gaza and that it has been so high, because these terrorists, who care 
nothing about the individuals, have a long history of using Palestinian 
civilians as human shields for their own benefit.
  And then Hamas operates a vast network of tunnels underneath Gaza. 
The tunnels shield terrorists from the dangerous fighting above ground. 
They also store critical supplies like water, food, and fuel, which are 
being kept from the Palestinian civilians. As many of us are concerned 
about the humanitarian disaster caused by Hamas's attack on Israel, it 
is Hamas itself that is exacerbating and making the humanitarian crisis 
worse.
  It seems likely that the tunnels are also the hiding place for more 
than 200 hostages taken by Hamas last month. A video recently shared 
online of a Hamas gunman who was captured and interrogated by the 
Israeli officials was particularly revealing. He said that Hamas 
shelters in tunnels and basements under clinics, schools, and hospitals 
because they know the Israelis will not target those locations out of 
concern for the collateral damage or damage to innocent civilians. That 
is why Hamas deliberately places innocent Palestinians between its 
terrorist foot soldiers and incoming rockets.
  As a result of Hamas's human shield strategy, the number of civilian 
casualties in Gaza is devastating. There is no denying that. It is 
important, though, to remember that the pain and suffering that is 
occurring throughout Israel and Gaza is directly attributable to Hamas, 
a U.S.-designated terrorist organization serving as a proxy for the No. 
1 state-sponsor of terrorism, which is Iran. The blood of this war is 
clearly on Hamas's hands.
  As the fighting continues, I am reminded of a saying that has been 
around for years: If Hamas laid down its weapons today, there would be 
no more violence. If Israel laid down its weapons, there would be no 
more Israel.
  Hamas is not fighting for peace. It is trying to wipe Israel off the 
map--again, as a proxy for its sponsor, which is the Supreme Leader in 
Tehran. They all share a desire to wipe the Jewish State off the map 
entirely.
  The United States cannot equivocate between good and evil. We must 
stand with Israel. There is no question that words are important. We 
have a responsibility to voice our support, speak out against Hamas, 
and call out dangerous anti-Semitic slander when we see it.
  But words alone are not enough. America has a responsibility to come 
to the aid of our ally with the resources it needs not only to fight 
but to actually win this war. This includes air defense systems that 
safeguard Israeli people from rocket attacks. It includes intelligence 
support to stay one step ahead of the terrorists. And it includes 
military aid to find and eliminate the Hamas threat.
  As part of that commitment, Congress has a big job to do. We need to 
pass a supplemental funding bill to ensure Israel has the tools it 
needs to defeat Hamas terrorists, and, last week, the House of 
Representatives did just that. They passed an Israel aid bill with 
bipartisan support. Their legislation would provide up to $14.3 billion 
to ensure that Israel has the resources they need to defend themselves.
  Our friends across the Capitol offset the spending by reallocating a 
portion

[[Page S5391]]

of the bloated IRS funding from the Democrats' massive so-called 
Inflation Reduction Act. I would add that that was $14.3 billion out of 
an $80 billion appropriation to the Internal Revenue Service, hardly 
the majority of that funding.
  But if our colleagues on the other side of the aisle don't like those 
pay-fors, then they are free to come up with an alternative. But the 
truth is, they don't believe in paying for anything. And we saw, just 
this last year, about $670 billion paid by the United States to our 
bond holders to help finance this national debt, and that is not 
getting any better by the day. Certainly, if we were to pass another 
supplemental appropriations bill to aid Israel or Ukraine, or for any 
other purpose, and actually make our national debt worse, it would put 
us on a perilous path.
  Well, President Biden, who said, ``We stand with Israel; we will do 
anything that they need us to do,'' has actually threatened to veto the 
$14.3 billion supplemental appropriations bill that was passed by the 
House. How he can reconcile his stated support for Israel and his 
threat to veto a supplemental appropriations bill escapes me.
  Then there is the majority leader here in the Senate--the Senator 
from New York, Senator Schumer--who said that the House bill is dead on 
arrival in the Senate, and he took his opposition a step further, 
blasting this legislation as ``stunningly unserious'' and ``a joke.''
  Well, I have to respectfully disagree with the majority leader. There 
is nothing funny about denying Israel the assistance it needs in 
defending itself against this terrorist threat. It is no secret that 
America's national debt has put us in an extremely vulnerable position.
  Thirteen years ago, Admiral Michael Mullen, who was Chairman of the 
Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that ``the most significant threat to our 
national security is our debt.'' That actually struck me as a little 
unusual at the time. But, at that time, the national debt was roughly 
$13.5 trillion. Since then, it has more than doubled to $33.6 trillion 
and counting.
  So I think that what he was getting at is that the more we end up 
spending money that we are borrowing from subsequent generations and 
the more interest we have to continue to pay to people willing to buy 
our debt, we are going to have a whole lot less financial resources and 
flexibility that we need when unexpected things occur, like the Russian 
invasion of Ukraine or Hamas's invasion of Israel. We simply won't have 
the money and the flexibility to do what we expect America to do, which 
is to always lead and be an agent for peace and stability.
  If we continue at this pace, our children and grandchildren will have 
no chance of digging out from under this debt. There is an old saying 
that ``the best time to start was yesterday; the next best time to 
start is now.'' We have a responsibility to start chipping away at the 
national debt now and certainly not to make it any worse. Every single 
spending bill is an opportunity to make tough but necessary choices to 
achieve that goal.

  I am disappointed that the majority of our Democratic colleagues 
don't seem to have any interest in addressing this threat to our 
national security. Over the last couple of years, they have spent, on a 
party-line basis, $2.6 trillion without a single Republican vote, and 
now they blast an attempt to address the growing debt as ``unserious.''
  Well, that $2.6 trillion in spending that our Democratic colleagues 
did on a party-line basis was partly responsible for our 40-year high 
inflation rate that is eating up the standard of living of hard-working 
Americans across the country. I think the figure I saw indicates that, 
if this is broken down per capita, it is roughly worth slightly under 
$1,000 in additional costs for the average family.
  Our Democratic colleagues, if they didn't like the pay-for provided 
by the House of Representatives, they could have suggested different 
offsets. You can't tell me, given the amount of money the Federal 
Government spends, that it couldn't find offsets for $14.3 billion. Or 
the majority leader could have simply put the bill on the floor and 
left room open for an amendment process. But, instead, he resorted to 
name-calling and trying to belittle the serious efforts that the House 
has undertaken, both to deal with the emergency in Israel and the 
national debt.
  In the next couple of weeks, the Senate and the House are going to 
have to work together to address the major issues that are swirling in 
front of Congress right now, which include Israel, Ukraine, the border, 
and, yes, keeping the government funded. This is hardly the way to 
start off on a good foot.
  Republicans and Democrats in Congress overwhelmingly support Israel. 
We agree that the United States needs to provide support for our ally. 
At the same time, we need to get serious about addressing another 
massive national security threat, which is our growing national debt 
and the crowding out of our ability to spend money on other necessary 
priorities instead of paying China and Japan, who own that debt.
  Washington has a spending problem. That is the first thing we need to 
acknowledge. Unfortunately, many of my colleagues are unwilling to 
acknowledge it. We have to get it under control.
  Today marks 1 month since Hamas attacked Israel, and I am 
disappointed that the Senate has yet to act on support--financial 
support--for our closest ally in the Middle East. I have no idea what 
Senator Schumer's plans are to actually process this supplemental 
appropriation. I don't know how long Israel will have to sustain the 
onslaught of Hamas's rockets and terrorist attacks on its people before 
the U.S. Congress and the U.S. Government will respond, as President 
Biden said we would.
  Under the leadership of Speaker Johnson, the House did its job. It 
passed legislation to provide $14.3 billion for Israel with bipartisan 
support. So I come to the floor profoundly disappointed that Senator 
Schumer refuses to take up this emergency supplemental appropriations 
bill to aid Israel.
  The United States has a responsibility to stand with Israel. I think 
that is the consensus position here in Congress on a bipartisan basis. 
But it takes more than just words. It takes action.
  One month after the war began is too long to respond to the needs 
that the people of Israel have to defend their country and their way of 
life. I hope we can see movement on this aid package for Israel sooner 
rather than later.
  I yield the floor.