Marco Rubio. Credit: Gage Skidmore

(Note: At a June 10 event hosted by the Republican Jewish Coalition’s Florida Region Chapter, Marco Rubio, Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, delivered the following remarks about the need for the United States to stand with Israel without equivocation or hesitation. They are reprinted in full below.)

Today, our nation faces economic and security threats as great as any it has ever confronted.

Over the last 16.5 months, our current administration has placed our country on a dangerous and unsustainable economic path. They are undermining our free market system through unbridled, wasteful spending on a big government agenda that has failed to create the jobs promised. It has paid for this agenda with an exploding debt, recklessly borrowing money to the tune of $4.9 billion each day.

The world is a safer place when America is the strongest country in the world. But America’s security relies as much on our economic vitality and power as it does on our military and diplomatic strength. Our enemies care as much about our debt as they do about our missiles.  And they dream not only of more days like Sept.11, but also of a Greece-like day of reckoning for America.

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 This administration’s dangerous economic policies are tragically coupled with a dangerous foreign policy, as well. In just 16 months, this administration has done the following:

• offended our Honduran allies by strong-arming civilians marching for a return to a constitutional democracy;
• done little to pressure China to rein in North Korea;
• snubbed Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu;
• sat quietly while Russia formalized its occupation of the Republic of Georgia, and abandoned our European allies by canceling plans to deploy missile defense sites.

The Obama doctrine of appeasing our enemies, alienating our allies, and delegating our national security to the international community may have won President Obama a Nobel Peace Prize, but it has made the world a more volatile and dangerous place.

This administration has turned its back on the decades-old post-World War II system of alliances that previous presidents, Republicans and Democrats alike, built and nurtured. The result has been chaos. Today our allies look at America and the future of U.S. foreign policy as a proverbial jump ball, with unprecedented uncertainty about where America will stand.

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Israel is a particularly striking example of what is wrong with President Obama’s approach to foreign policy. The modern state of Israel is deeply rooted in ancient times. And despite being under the control of various powers, resulting in a worldwide Jewish Diaspora, there has been a continuous, unbroken Jewish presence in the land of Israel for over 3,000 years.

Israel declared its independence on May 14, 1948 and its neighbors attacked. And Israel has been under military, economic, diplomatic and propaganda attack ever since.

Simply put, no nation on Earth has faced or is facing the combination and severity of threats as Israel has. Its entire population lives with thousands of missiles and rockets constantly aimed at them. Routine acts -- such as riding a bus to work or school, or sitting in a café reading or surfing the Internet -- require an unnecessary level of courage amid homicide bombers.

Terrorist groups such as Hamas have enshrined Israel’s destruction in their founding charters. And nations such as Iran, and its illegitimate president, publicly deny Israel’s right to exist, call for her annihilation, defy the world by developing nuclear weapons, and support terrorist proxies to carry out their deadly work.
Israel’s enemies have made war zones out of buses, cafes, malls, airplanes, and even an Olympic village in Munich.