American Leadership is Powerful Agent for Freedom, Peace, and Democracy

Floor Speech

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Mr. MOORE of Utah. Mr. Speaker, American leadership has always been the most influential, powerful agent for freedom, peace, and democracy.

One month ago, the House stood up to protect our values and national interests by passing a bipartisan package to help Israel defend itself from Hamas.

I recently attended a screening of the footage from Hamas that Chairman McCaul and Ranking Member Meeks invited us all to, and I am so grateful for their leadership to have us do that. I knew it was footage that would be tough to see, but I knew it was footage I needed to see. I won't ever be the same after having seen that.

As we support our ally, we must take a comprehensive look at the Biden administration's Middle East policy.

Encapsulating all of my thoughts today in my remarks is a simple concept: With foreign policy, although it would be desired by all, you can't have it all. You have to make tough choices when it comes to foreign policy. You don't get to have everything that you would ever want. You cannot have it all with respect to foreign policy.

I will share a little bit about how important it is to take a stand.

While I am grateful for President Biden's clear support for Israel, his administration's attempts to placate Iran, the number one state sponsor of terrorism in the world, have been a critical misstep.

For the past 3 years, the Biden administration has embarked on a deeply misguided and contradictory quest to resurrect the Iran nuclear deal while begrudgingly continuing one of the Trump and Pence administration's most successful efforts at peace in the Middle East, the Abraham Accords, and the recognition of Israel by its Arab neighbors in embracing diplomatic and economic ties through these accords.

Rather than maintaining the maximum pressure campaign that sanctioned and starved Iran of foreign revenue, the Biden administration has balked at enforcing sanctions. They have allowed Iranian oil exports to surge back to levels higher than they were in 2018 and attempted to unfreeze billions of dollars in Iranian assets from foreign banks.

The Iranian regime is flush with cash thanks to the global energy crisis and the administration's policy of appeasement. Iran uses this cash to fund, equip, and train a terrorist network across the region. This includes groups like Hamas and Hezbollah.

According to reports from The Wall Street Journal, 500 or so Hamas terrorists trained in Iran in the months leading up to the October 7 attack on innocent Israelis. The Iranian regime has developed this terror network not just in Gaza and Lebanon but also in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen for one purpose: to cause just enough chaos to make the Arab world think twice about sustainable peace with Israel and the reliability of U.S. diplomacy.

The Biden administration says its Iran appeasement is geared toward preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, a goal I think we could all get behind, but it has obviously emboldened Iran and undermined regional security.

We need our four main regional security partners--Israel, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkiye--to work together in unity, and we need America to lead on this front.

President Biden's approach creates tremendous doubt that the United States is more committed to the security of our partners than to a delusional accommodation of Iran. What must Riyadh, Cairo, and Istanbul have thought these past 3 years while watching the U.S. respond meekly to Iranian proxy groups disrupting political order, trafficking illegal weapons, and lobbing rockets at American diplomats with impunity?

Iran would love nothing more than for Saudi Arabia to think twice about normalizing relations with Israel, given the current crisis. Iran would love nothing more than for Egypt to decide that the opportunity costs for working with Israel on humanitarian corridors in Gaza, something that I have been calling for in a bipartisan fashion, is too high. Iran would love nothing more than for Turkiye to decide that it is more beneficial to work directly with Iran rather than through the United States.

The Trump-Pence administration correctly understood that the Abraham Accords were the best chance we have for sustainable peace in the Middle East. We are stronger together than we are apart.

President Biden is undermining regional security and unity by appeasing the region's chief destabilizer: Iran. We must enforce sanctions, communicate clearly that we stand on the side of Israel and our partners, and line up our diplomatic and military commitments with our national interests that are also the national interests of Israel and the Arab world.

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