Sen. Ted Cruz Statement on Israel-Hezbollah Ceasefire
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, released the following statement regarding the announcement of a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah:
“Our Israeli allies have accomplished enormous military successes over the last year against the Iranian-controlled terrorist group Hezbollah, killing thousands of Hezbollah terrorists, eliminating Hezbollah's entire command, and dismantling its infrastructure across Lebanon. These actions have directly contributed to vital American national security interests, including directly by liquidating terrorist leaders who had the blood of hundreds of Americans on their hands. Indeed, the U.S.-Israel relationship is at the core of U.S. interests in the Middle East, and American policy should be to provide unequivocal military and diplomatic support to our Israeli allies to fully ensure their security.
“However, the Biden administration has spent the last four years pathologically obsessed with undermining Israel and boosting Iran, including by coercing our Israeli allies to cede maritime territory to Hezbollah. They are now using the transition period to the Trump administration and a Republican Congress to try to lock in those efforts - and to constrain the incoming administration - by establishing what they believe to be irreversible diplomatic, legal, and military policies. However, these and similar international policies are not irreversible. This month, I led a letter co-signed by 10 other Senators saying that the U.S. will fundamentally reevaluate our relationship with the U.N. and the Palestinians if Palestinian President Abbas fulfills a pledge he made to secure Israel's expulsion from the U.N. General Assembly. Last week, I joined my colleagues in vowing to act against the International Criminal Court for undermining American and Israeli interests by issuing arrest warrants for Israeli leaders, and said everyone involved in the decision should face American sanctions.
“I am deeply disturbed both by reports that Obama-Biden officials exerted enormous pressure on our Israeli allies to accept this ceasefire and by how those officials are characterizing Israel's obligations. This pressure and these statements are further efforts to undermine Israel and constrain the incoming Trump administration. Obama-Biden officials pressured our Israeli allies into accepting the ceasefire by withholding weapons they needed to defend themselves and counter Hezbollah, and by threatening to facilitate a further, broader, binding international arms embargo through the United Nations. Obama-Biden officials are already trying to use Israel's acceptance of this ceasefire to ensure that Hezbollah and other Iranian terrorist groups remain intact across Lebanon, and to limit Israel's future freedom of action and self-defense. Administration officials, including Secretary of State Blinken, today even downplayed Israel's right under the ceasefire to strike terrorist groups in Lebanon when those groups pose imminent threats.
“These constraints have been rejected by our Israeli allies. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that under the ceasefire Israel retains full freedom of action to counter Hezbollah if the group attacks Israel or tries to rebuild its terrorist infrastructure. The United States should allow and assist Israel in doing so, and I am committed to working closely with the Trump administration and my colleagues in the incoming Congress to ensure they are able to so.”
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