Speech to the Knesset in Jerusalem, Israel
(October 27, 1994)
Mr. President, Mr. Prime Minister, Mr. Speaker, Mr.
Netanyahu, ladies and gentlemen of the Knesset: Let me begin by thanking
the Prime Minister and the people of Israel for welcoming me to your
wonderful country, and thanking all of you for giving me the opportunity
to address this great democratic body where, clearly, people of all
different views are welcome to express their convictions. I feel right
at home. [Laughter]
Yesterday Israel took a great stride toward fulfilling
the ancient dream of the Jewish people, the patriarchs' dream of a strong
and plentiful people living freely in their own land, enjoying the fruits
of peace with their neighbors. Nearly 17 years after President Sadat
came to this Chamber to seek peace and Prime Minister Begin reached
out in reconciliation, and just over a year after Israel and the PLO
declared a pathway to peace on the South Lawn of the White House, Israel
and Jordan have now written a new chapter.
Tonight we praise the courage of the leaders who have
given life to this treaty, Prime Minister Rabin and Foreign Minister
Peres. They have shown the vision and the tenacity of other leaders
of Israel's past whose names will be remembered always for their devotion
to your cause and your people: Ben Gurion, Meir, Begin.
In your life, Prime Minister, we see the life of your
country. As a youth, you wished to fulfill the commandment to farm the
land of Israel, but instead you had to answer the call to defend the
people of Israel. You have devoted your life to cultivating strength
so that others could till the soil in safety. You have fought many battles
and won many victories in war. Now, in strength, you are fighting and
winning battles for peace. Indeed, you have shown your people that they
can free themselves from siege, that for the first time they can make
real a peace for the generations.
For the American people, too, this peace is a blessing.
For decades, as Israel has struggled to survive, we have rejoiced in
your triumphs and shared in your agonies. In the years since Israel
was founded, Americans of every faith have admired and supported you.
Like your country, ours is a land that welcomes exiles, a nation of
hope, a nation of refuge. From the Orient and Europe and now from the
former Soviet Union, your people have come, Ashkenazim and Sephardim,
Yemenites and Ethiopians, all of you committed to living free, to building
a common home. One of nearly four of the citizens of this country is
an Arab, something very few people know beyond your borders. Even without
the blessings of secure borders, you have secured for your own people
the blessings of democracy. With all of its turmoil and debate, it is
still the best of all systems.
In times of war and times of peace, every President
of the United States since Harry Truman and every Congress has understood
the importance of Israel. The survival of Israel is important not only
to our interests, but to every single value we hold dear as a people.
Our role in war has been to help you defend yourself by yourself. That
is what you have asked. Now that you are taking risks for peace, our
role is to help you to minimize the risks of peace.
I am committed to working with our Congress to maintain
the current levels of military and economic assistance. We have taken
concrete steps to strengthen Israel's qualitative edge. The U.S.-Israel
Science and Technology Commission, unprecedented Israeli access to the
U.S. high-technology market, and acquisition of advanced computers,
all these keep Israel in the forefront of global advances and competitive
and global markets.
I have also taken steps to enhance Israel's military
and your capacity to address possible threats not only to yourselves
but to the region. F–15 aircraft are being provided and F–16's
transferred out of U.S. stocks. We work closely with you to develop
the Arrow missile, to protect against the threat of ballistic missiles.
As we help to overcome the risks of peace, we also
are helping to build a peace that will bring with it the safety and
security Israel deserves. That peace must be real, based on treaty commitments
arrived at directly by the parties, not imposed from outside. It must
be secure. Israel must always be able to defend itself by itself. And
it must be comprehensive. We have worked hard to end the Arab boycott,
and we've had some success. But we will not stop until it is completely
lifted. There is a treaty with Jordan and an agreement with the PLO.
But we must keep going until Syria and Lebanon close the circle of states
entering into peace and the other nations of the Arab world normalize
their relations with Israel.
This morning in Damascus I discussed peace with President
Asad. He repeated at our press conference what he had earlier said to
his own Parliament: Syria has made a strategic choice for peace with
Israel. He also explained that Syria is ready to commit itself to the
requirements of peace through the establishment of normal peaceful relations
with Israel. His hope, as he articulated it, is to transform the region
from a state of war to a state of peace that enables both Arabs and
Israelis to live in security, stability, and prosperity.
We have been urging President Asad to speak to you
in a language of peace that you can understand. Today he began to do
so. Of course, it would take more than words, much more than words.
Yet I believe something is changing in Syria. Its leaders understand
that it is time to make peace. There will still be a good deal of hard
bargaining before a breakthrough, but they are serious about proceeding.
Just as we have worked with you from Camp David to
Wadi Araba to bring peace with security to your people, so too we will
walk with you on the road to Damascus for peace with security.
There are those who see peace still as all too distant.
Surely, they include the families of those burned in the rubble of the
community center in Buenos Aires, those in the basement of New York's
World Trade Center, the loved ones of the passengers on bus number 5,
and of course, two people who, as been noted, are in this Chamber with
us tonight. And we honor the parents of Corporal Nahshon Waxman, a son
of your nation and, I proudly say, a citizen of ours.
We grieve with the families of those who are lost and
with all the people of Israel. So long as Jews are murdered just because
they are Jews or just because they are citizens of Israel, the plague
of anti-Semitism lives, and we must stand against it. We must stand
against terror as strongly as we stand for peace, for without an end
to terror there can be no peace.
The forces of terror and extremism still threaten us
all. Sometimes they pretend to act in the name of God and country. But
their deeds violate their own religious faith and make a mockery of
any notion of honorable patriotism.
As I said last night to the Parliament in Jordan, we
respect Islam. Millions of American citizens every day answer the Moslem
call to prayer. But we know that the real fight is not about religion
or culture. It is about a worldwide conflict between those who believe
in peace and those who believe in terror, those who believe in hope
and those who believe in fear.
Those who stoke the fires of violence and seek to destroy
the peace, make no mistake about it, have one great goal. Their goal
is to make the people of Israel, who have defeated all odds on the field
of battle, to give up inside on the peace by giving in to the doubts
that terror brings to every one of us. But having come so far, you cannot
give up or give in. Your future must lie in the words of a survivor
of the carnage of bus number 5 who said, "I want the peace process
to continue. I want to live in peace. I want my children to live in
peace."
So let us say to the merchants of terror once again:
You cannot succeed; you must not succeed; you will not succeed. You
are the past, not the future; the peacemakers are the future.
I say to you, my friends, in spite of all the dangers
and difficulties that still surround you, the circle of your enemies
is shrinking. Their time has passed. Their increasing isolation is reflected
in the desperation of their disgusting deeds.
Once in this area you were shunned. Now, more and more,
you are embraced. As you share the waters of the River Jordan and work
with your neighbors, new crops will emerge where the soil is now barren.
As you join together to mine the Dead Sea for its minerals, you will
bring prosperity to all your people. As you roll up the barbed wire
and cross the desert of Araba, the sands will yield new life to you.
As you dock in each other's ports along the Gulf of Aqaba, more and
more people will have the chance to experience the wonders of both your
lands, and more and more children will share the joys of youth, not
the dread of war.
This is the great promise of peace. It is the promise
of making sure that all those who have sacrificed their lives did not
die in vain; the promise of a Sabbath afternoon not violated by gunfight,
a drive across the plains to the mountains of Moab where Moses died
and Ruth was born, a Yom Kippur of pure prayer without the rumble of
tanks, voices of fear, or rumors of war. After all the bloodshed and
all your tears, you are now far closer to the day when the clash of
arms is heard no more and all the children of Abraham, the children
of Isaac, the children of Israel will live side by side in peace.
This was, after all, the message the prophet Mohammed
himself brought to peoples of other faiths when he said, "There
is no argument between us and you. God will bring us together, and unto
Him is the homecoming." And this was the message Moses spoke to
the children of Israel, when for the last time he spoke to them as they
gathered across the River Jordan into the Promised Land, when he said,
"I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose
life so that you and your descendants may live."
This week, once again, the people of Israel made a
homecoming. Once again, you chose life. Once again, America was proud
to walk with you.
The Prime Minister mentioned a story in his remarks
that he never asked me about. Wouldn't it be embarrassing if it weren't
true? [Laughter] The truth is that the only time my wife and I ever
came to Israel before today was 13 years ago with my pastor on a religious
mission. I was then out of office. I was the youngest former Governor
in the history of the United States. [Laughter] No one thought I would
ever be here; perhaps my mother, no one else. [Laughter] We visited
the holy sites. I relived the history of the Bible, of your Scriptures
and mine, and I formed a bond with my pastor. Later, when he became
desperately ill, he said he thought I might one day become President.
And he said, more bluntly than the Prime Minister did, "If you
abandon Israel, God will never forgive you." He said, "It
is God's will that Israel, the biblical home of the people of Israel,
continue forever and ever."
So I say to you tonight, my friends, one of our Presidents,
John Kennedy, reminded us that here on Earth, God's will must truly
be our own. It is for us to make the homecoming, for us to choose life,
for us to work for peace. But until we achieve a comprehensive peace
in the Middle East and then after we achieve comprehensive peace in
the Middle East, know this: Your journey is our journey, and America
will stand with you now and always.
Thank you, and God bless you.
Sources: Public Papers of the President |