Don Nickles: “But it is interesting, the second statement says it: Condemns acts of violence, especially the excessive use of force…”

“But it is interesting, the second statement says it: Condemns acts of violence, especially the excessive use of force against Palestinians, resulting in injury and loss of human life. No. 3, it: Calls upon Israel, the occupying Power, to abide scrupulously by its legal obligations. . . . It does not say for the Palestinians and it does not say for Mr. Arafat to abide by its obligations, and it does not talk about the Palestinians and their use of force. I heard my colleague from New Jersey talk about the fact that Palestinians had a couple of Israelis who were murdered. So my point is that the President of the United States should have urged our representative at the United Nations to veto this, use our veto in the Security Council to veto this very unbalanced, very biased, very anti-Israel resolution. And they did not do it. I think that was a mistake. Now we see more violence. This recent attack on the U.S.S. Cole on October 12 killed 17 and wounded dozens. I think many of us were shocked by that. I heard some of the statements by the Secretary of State, by the Secretary of Defense, by the President: Boy, we're going to hold those people, those terrorists, those cowards who committed this cowardly deed and killed innocent U.S. soldiers, accountable. Well, Mr. President, I have heard those words before. In many cases in past history, those words have been a lot stronger than our deeds. That bothers this Senator.…”