This bill begins to tackle these challenges in a comprehensive way.

How much time do I have? The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from New York has 10\1/2\ minutes remaining.

I now yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell), a very distinguished member of both the Budget and Ways and Means Committees and a member of the Ukrainian Caucus as well.

I want to continue to urge my colleagues to support the resolution. As anyone can see, this is a very bipartisan resolution. It is very important. I yield back the balance of my time.

This is a point that Ranking Member Eliot Engel and myself raised and underscored with President Maliki when he visited Washington last fall.

When I look back at the war in Iraq, what really breaks my heart is that we lost so many Americans, so much American blood, and now it's almost as if we didn't do anything.

I just want to make one final comment and that it's--it was my opinion when the chairman and I met with Mr. Maliki that he was a good listener but I didn't think he provided too much in terms of answers to the questions we had, one of…

I appreciate the close collaboration that we have working on this and so many other issues on this committee.

This resolution underscores to protesters, to the government, and to all Ukrainians that the United States will continue to defend Ukraine's sovereign right to chart its own course and build its own future.

I strongly condemn all acts of violence.

America stands with Israel.

Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians have come out in the streets to show their support not only for closer relations with Europe but also more fundamentally for democracy, more accountable government, human rights and basic human dignity.

Whereas a democratic, prosperous, and independent Ukraine is in the national interest of the United States;

I really think that I would decline to chop this up at this date.

I think that the demonstrators in the streets of Kyiv are asking the President to resign so that new elections can be held.

Now is the time to reaffirm the importance we place on the U.S.-Israel relationship.

I certainly think that it is not off base or out of line to express our feelings in that regard.

I believe that it is indeed essential for the United States to show our strong support for the democratic aspirations of the Ukrainian people.

the ``whereas'' clauses just simply state the facts.

I was very disappointed by the Ukrainian Government's decision last November to reject an offer from the European Union for closer economic and political ties.

It is imperative that all sides exercise restraint and avoid confrontation.

I commend the efforts of the administration and our European partners to de-escalate tensions.

I applaud the administration's decision to revoke the U.S. visas of the Ukrainian Government officials who were responsible for ordering or committing acts of violence against peaceful protesters.

I happen to believe, as the demonstrators do, that the country would be far better off working out a partnership with the European Union than with the Russian customs union.

I strongly support H.R. 938, the Israel Strategic Partnership Act. Israel is one of our closest and most reliable allies.