Political Quotes

“just yesterday the Palestinian Assembly finally took steps to amend their charter, which calls for Israel's destruction. I have been speaking about that for a number of years here on the House floor. The United States aid to the Palestinian entity, which is about a half a billion dollars, is predicated on the removal of those covenants. Just last week I took that to the House floor and said that the date, May 7, is the date by which the covenants must be amended. According to United States law that date is 2 months after the Palestinian elections. Yesterday the Palestinian Assembly did take steps to remove the covenants. The council amends the Palestinian national covenant by canceling clauses which contradict the letters exchanged between the PLO and the Israel Government. So, in essence, the clauses which contradict the letters exchanged by the PLO and the Israeli Government are those clauses which call for the destruction of Israel. That is a positive step, although I must say, Mr. Speaker, it would have been far better if they would have been much more explicit and explicitly mentioned the covenants which are revoked. That would have been a lot better. Still, I want to give credit where credit is due. The second thing to which they agreed was that the Palestinian Assembly would draft a new charter within a few short months. We are going to be looking and we are going to be seeing what is the language in that charter.”