Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I stand before you today to discuss the comments made recently by Secretary Kerry regarding Israel and apartheid. I am not going to be one of the many people that are probably calling for Secretary Kerry's resignation in that regard. I too work in the arena of public policy, and I understand that sometimes you make mistakes in the things you say, you say things that you didn't necessarily intend to say. I think it is very instructive to talk about it for just a few moments here. I want to remind everybody that Israel first fought a War of Independence in 1948 and 1949, and then fought again in 1967 in the Six Day War and then again in 1973 with the Yom Kippur War. During these periods of time, they were attacked, unilaterally attacked by their neighbors. Some people say: Well, we need to go back to those pre-1967 borders. I ask anybody who was attacked, who has been in a fight where somebody sucker-punched them, who was the aggressor, why is it incumbent upon Israel to return the spoils of the war? Folks attacked them, they fought the war, and they won, and they want to secure their population. Because of that, some people think that somehow Israel is the oppressor. They reacted to an act of aggression.…”