[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 2]
[House]
[Page 2492]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




      WE WILL STAND BY THE JEWISH COMMUNITY IN CARACAS, VENEZUELA

  (Mr. ENGEL asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, just a few days ago, there was a despicable 
attack on the largest synagogue in Caracas, Venezuela, which was 
orchestrated and very, very disgraceful. Twenty members of the House of 
Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee wrote a strong letter to 
President Hugo Chavez asking him not only to condemn this but to take 
strong steps to prevent it. The fact of the matter is it is Hugo 
Chavez's actions which led to this. He created the atmosphere which led 
to this, a climate of fear and intimidation against the Jewish 
community in Venezuela. This has to stop.
  When you single out the Jewish community and ask them to condemn 
Israel and tell them that they must do it, this creates this kind of 
atmosphere. This is government sponsored, as far as I'm concerned. We 
will continue to monitor it.
  We will not leave the Jewish community to stand by itself there. We 
will be with them every step of the way. And we will not allow Hugo 
Chavez to continue to intimidate those people. There are 25,000 people, 
ten of them have left. We're going to monitor the situation very 
carefully.

                          ____________________