Ted Cruz Stands with Israel in the Holy Land

Senator Ted Crux (R-TX) was in Israel Monday. The Senator from Texas spoke of the need to stand with Israel against the many Islamist entities that seek their destruction.

Cruz did not buy into the mutual culpability argument that both sides are to blame for the lack of peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. He said it was the Palestinian leadership’s failure to denounce acts of terror, along with their refusal to recognize Israel’s right to exist as the lone Jewish state in the world.

The Senator is on a two day trip to Israel. He will then fly to Poland, Ukraine, and Estonia, thought of as a solidarity trip with the East European nations that are dealing with aggression from Russia.

Cruz said of the Palestinian leadership, “The principal impediment to peace is that, to date, the Palestinians have refused to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state and have refused to renounce terror.” The Senator continued, “Unless and until the Palestinians can agree on those very basic starting blocks, no lasting peace solution is likely.”

Cruz was highly critical of the Obama administration’s policies in the Middle East. He described the administration’s stance on the Middle East peace talks as “to criticize and harangue and pressure the Israeli government.”

When Secretary of State John Kerry used the term “apartheid” to describe what would happen if the “peace talks” failed, Cruz immediately called for Kerry’s resignation. While in Israel, Cruz reiterated his stance against Kerry’s inflammatory rhetoric, again calling for the Secretary of State to resign. “For the secretary of state to use a loaded term like ‘apartheid’ with regard to Israel was grotesquely inaccurate and deeply harmful,” said Cruz. He worried terrorist groups now have the rhetorical ammunition to continue to wage their disinformation campaign against Israel. “Those words will be repeated by the enemies of Israel, by Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran,” he said.

Cruz firmly believes that the United States does not need to be an intermediary in the peace talks. “Terms of peace should not be dictated by outsiders,” said Cruz.

It is not the United States’ business dictating Israel’s settlement policy in the disputed West Bank region, explained Cruz. He said the settlements are a “question for the government of Israel.” Its not “America’s role to try to impose a policy about where Israeli settlements are located and where they’re not.”