Christie offers tough talk on Israel at AIPAC gala
Pundits ask whether gov may be eying vice-presidential nod
Gov. Chris Christie
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February 15, 2012
Crossing state lines to tackle international issues, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie told the American Israel Public Affairs Committee that “America should stand by its friends and its democratic allies even, and sometimes especially, when it’s unpopular to do so.”
Christie was widely quoted at a technically off-the-record Feb. 10 address to a packed grand ballroom at the New York Hilton Hotel.
The Republican governor quoted a Democratic president, Franklin D Roosevelt, to underscore his support for Israel.
“Please judge me by the enemies I have made,” said Christie, citing FDR as his source, then adding, “In that same spirit, I would like to say to all of you tonight: I admire Israel for the enemies it has made.”
According to a report by newjerseynewsroom.com, the governor told members of AIPAC’s northeast region that “it may not be fashionable in some of the chancelleries, the foreign ministries, and salons around the world to talk about why America stands with Israel — but that’s no excuse not to be saying [it] and saying it loudly.”
Christie’s tough talk on a key foreign policy issue triggered new speculation, particularly in parts of the conservative blogosphere, that he may still be seeking higher office, perhaps as the Republican vice presidential candidate.
Although the governor did not mention President Barack Obama in his remarks, the president and Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi were both booed by some members of the audience when they appeared in video presentation at the dinner, according to observers.
Some 2,700 people were in attendance.
Roger Jacobs, a West Orange attorney and former chair of the Community Relations Committee of MetroWest, attended the event and said he was “extremely pleased to hear the governor’s exuberance about Israel.”
“I thought he delivered his remarks about Israel and its role as our friend with great excitement,” Jacobs, a Democrat, told NJJN.
Steve Newmark, a political independent from Florham Park and past president of the NJ Jewish News board, also attended the dinner.
“I thought the governor was great,” said Newmark, a past chair of the CRC’s government affairs committee. “He was relating to the crowd. He was sincere and down-to-earth. You could relate to him.”
Democrat Roy Tanzman, a Woodbridge attorney and AIPAC activist, told NJJN, “It was a good substantive speech. Usually Christie is more rough-and-tumble, but this was a nice policy speech.”
Jennifer Rubin, a conservative blogger for the Washington Post, was among the pundits offering speculation over Christie’s ambitions.
“He is both a surrogate for Mitt Romney and someone who surely must be on the short list for vice president,” she wrote. “Conservative hawks should be very glad…to see him on the presidential ticket.”
rwiener@njjewishnews.com
Christie's remarks at the 2012 AIPAC Annual Northeast Regional Dinner
Thank you. Thank you for the warm welcome. And thank you, Phil [Darivoff] for your great introduction. Ambassador Prosor, it’s an honor to be here with you tonight as well. First, as Israel’s envoy to the United Kingdom, and now to the United Nations. It’s obvious Jerusalem has been giving you all the low-pressure assignments. Next you can come to New Jersey and see how you do there as well.
Thanks so much for inviting a shy and retiring governor to this delightful little suburb of New Jersey. While it’s clear that all of you are on the wrong side of the Hudson River, I have decided to venture over tonight due to the importance of the issues we need to discuss and to remind all of you that next year when you want to come to the opening game of the Super Bowl Champions, you’ll be coming to New Jersey.
I realize that in America today, politics is out of favor with many people, and with great justification. One need only look at Washington, D.C. today to understand our frustration with our national politics.
Elected officials spending more time talking at each other than to each other. Posturing and preening have replaced statesmanship.
It’s at times difficult to find optimism in a political scene when we are confronting so many monumental problems both at home and around the world. And feel as if our leaders’ are only concerned about how politically they look at night on CNN or FOX News or MSNBC.
So little real conversation in this, a presidential election year, about the solutions we need to undertake coming out of the nation’s capital.
So, where to go? Where to go for optimism about political leadership in America? Well, I would suggest to you that you need to look to the states and you couldn’t have come to a better place. Right here in New Jersey and New York you have examples of bipartisan leadership and compromise.
You have examples of divided government that actually works for the people who elected them.
You have leaders left with big problems by ineffective predecessors who have decided that there are two simple rules to getting things done in the atmosphere of 2012: tackle the big issues head on and tell the people the truth.
Here in New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo, and in New Jersey, I have decided to follow those simple rules and the results speak for themselves.
Getting tough things done and high political popularity are not mutually exclusive. One Democrat, One Republican. There is no bridge that cannot be built to success without strong and principled leadership, truth-telling leadership. That’s what people want from us today.
That’s what we need to move the cause of freedom and liberty ahead both here and around the world.
Of course, nobody understands this better than the citizen activists of AIPAC. Those of you in this audience tonight know a thing or two about truth telling and working across party lines.
You are Democrats and Republicans in this room tonight, Independents as well. People who might have differing views on a whole range of issues, and yet you have gathered together to join your hands and hearts to a greater cause: to nurture and strengthen the indispensible alliance between America and Israel, and insist that the United States play a vital role in world events.
So, I simply add my voice to the chorus of people who applaud you and AIPAC for all you do to advance the cause of justice, and just nations, in what is becoming an increasingly scary and unjust world.
I want to spend a moment with you tonight talking first about how the domestic challenges we face connect to American engagement in the world.
I say that because Americans do not have the luxury of thinking that what we have long viewed as purely domestic matters have no consequences beyond our border. They do.
And what we say and what we do here at home affects how others see us, and that, in turn, affects what it is they say and do domestically in their nation. With power comes influence; and whether we like it or not, America is tied to the world in a thousand different ways, large and small, seen and unseen.
America's role and significance in the world is defined, first and foremost, in my opinion, by who we are at home. It's defined by how we conduct ourselves with each other. It's defined by how we deal with our own problems. It is determined in large measure by how we set an example for the world. That’s why our recent political dysfunction in Washington, DC has such perilous ramifications for America’s standing all across the world.
We tend to still understand foreign policy as something designed by officials in the State Department and carried out by ambassadors and others overseas. And to some extent it is.
But one of the most powerful forms of foreign policy is the example we set. And let me be blunt on this point: the image of the United States around the world is not what it was. It is not what it can be. Is not what it should be. Because we are failing each other here at home.
This country pays a price whenever our economy fails to deliver rising living standards to our citizens, for all the obvious reasons but there’s a less obvious, but no less important reason to repair our disordered economy. Because problems at home often lead people who want to withdraw from the world – who see pulling back in the hopes of living in splendid isolation as a solution to the domestic problems we have at home. Folks understand something about this, I will tell you that it is awfully, awfully dangerous.
Staying engaged in the world gives us the opportunity to learn from others abroad, where they have proven models of success. Indeed, it might be a good idea for us to look to Israel for clues on how to get back to a path of innovation and growth in our economy.
I’m sure most of you in this room realize how important Israel has become for so many of our leading technology companies.
Most of the chips in our computers were designed or built by Intel Israel. Our mobile phones are full of Israeli technology. Apple is reportedly going to open its first R&D center outside of California in Israel. Israeli security technology companies are helping the United States protect our homeland.
Israeli inventions are saving American lives – like the pillcam – a swallowable camera that can detect cancer.
Israel produces more medical device patents per capita than any country in the world, and this is an extraordinary testimony to people in the United States right now that in Israel -- Israel has more startups than anywhere outside Silicon Valley.
That’s why it is no surprise that when New York City decided to run a global competition to build a new tech campus on Roosevelt Island, the winning team was Cornell and Technion – Israel’s M.I.T.
I want the entrepreneurs and startups spawned by that campus to live in New Jersey and build their companies in New Jersey.
But, more than that, I want to see New Jersey forming these kinds of win-win partnerships with Israeli startups, companies, universities, and hospitals.
New Jersey is the leading home, after all, of the pharmaceutical and biotech industry in the world, and is working right now with Teva Pharmaceuticals to form even greater bonds and partnerships between Israel’s leading pharma company and the world’s medicine cabinet, New Jersey.
As Phil mentioned, for those reasons I mentioned and for many others, Mary Pat and I will go to Israel for our first foreign trip this spring, and we’re bringing our children as well. Yes, it will be a mission to spur more trade and more partnerships, both economic and strategic, between Israel and the state of New Jersey, but more importantly to Mary Pat and I, it will be a great moment for our family.
For us, to experience this with our children – I was first invited a number of times to come to come to Israel with groups of other governors and elected officials, and I said no each time, not because I didn’t want to come to Israel, but because the first time I went to Israel I wanted it to be in Israel with my wife and my children. Because I think more than anything else it has to be a family experience first.
So it’s obvious to you that there is more to this for me than just economics. We can’t pull up the drawbridge that connects America to the rest of the world. That simply doesn't work. And as we learned to our horror a decade ago, we as a country and a people are vulnerable to terrorists armed with box cutters, bombs, and viruses, be they computer generated or man-made.
Out of the rubble and the ruins, and out of the destruction, we were reminded that evil men guided by an evil ideology can do great harm to us; that no nation, no state, and no city is beyond their reach. And so we need to remain vigilant together and be prepared to act together with our friends and allies to discourage, deter and defend against aggressors all across the world against our nation and Israel.
And this is a different fact of life that I was taught by my Sicilian mother in New Jersey, but applies just as much to Israel and the United States in this dangerous world we live in. Weakness invites aggression. And individuals, and nations, need to have the backs of our friends without compromise, and without exception.
Besides my Sicilian mother, you may wonder how a first-term governor of New Jersey understands this issue and its importance. And believe me, it’s not from my time in Trenton – it’s from my time as United States Attorney for New Jersey, the first United States Attorney in the post -9/11 era.
Two cases informed my view that terror must be met with resolve. Two cases showed me that failing to respond can lead to peril to our citizens both at home and abroad.
In my first few weeks as U.S. Attorney, Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was abducted. Because the e-mail that his captors sent to lure him to the site of the kidnapping went through the Dow Jones server in South Brunswick, N.J., I now came face to face, in my first two weeks as U.S. Attorney, with the responsibility of trying to save Danny Pearl’s life and to capture his adductors.
Unfortunately, even though we moved as quickly as we could, we could not move fast enough to avert tragedy.
Despite courageous efforts from law enforcement both at home and around the world, terrorists slaughtered Danny Pearl. All of us who worked around the clock for weeks to try to bring him home to his loving family felt an extraordinary emptiness for having failed. But it also filled us with greater understanding and extraordinary resolve.
And so, a few years later, the Mount Laurel, N.J. Police Department received a phone call from a store clerk who had just been asked to make a DVD from a video tape for a customer. The clerk watched the tape and he saw what appeared to be Muslim men practicing with semi-automatic weapons and screaming about jihad against the infidels.
The Mount Laurel Police Department called the F.B.I., along with my office, we began a year’s long surveillance which led to the uncovering of a plot to kill American servicemen and women at Fort Dix, NJ.
The “Fort Dix Six” were ultimately arrested, indicted and convicted by our office for the plot to kill American soldiers on American soil. They were sent to prison for life and they sit there tonight.
One case, where despite our best efforts, we couldn’t move quickly enough to prevent the loss of life, and one case where we leaned our lessons from earlier, we didn’t wait for someone to act, but acted first. Acted first to stop aggression. The lesson I learned from those cases was that the danger to those who live in freedom is everywhere and only swift and decisive action by those in power will preserve our way of life and those of our friends.
So I spent seven years as U.S. Attorney, and I was elected governor in 2009, and the one thing I resolved to do in my time as governor was to lead on the tough issues by telling the citizens of New Jersey the truth about the depth of our challenges. Tell them the truth about the difficulty of the solutions. Treat them like adults rather than children, not like other politicians.
This is the only effective way to lead in my opinion, and the only honorable way to lead in times of hardship and crisis. I think you are sick and tired of meeting politicians, and having them look you in the eye, and try to figure out what it is they think you want to hear. And then saying it to you. I think the type of leadership we need in America and around the world now is the type of leadership that tells you what you need to know without fear or hesitation.
And just as telling the truth with stubborn facts, as John Adams was quoted, is essential to how we govern at home, it is also essential, very essential, that we tell some simple truths to our friends and our adversaries around the world.
Here, then, are some truths that I think are worth saying often, and in public, to those who love America and to those who hate her.
The first is that America should stand by its friends and its democratic allies, even, and sometimes especially, when it’s unpopular to do so. And you know I know, that it may not be fashionable in some of the chancelleries, the foreign ministries, and salons around the world to talk about why America stands with Israel – but that’s no excuse not to be saying, and saying it loudly.
I read a quote from President Franklin Roosevelt which has thought made this point much better than I ever could. He says, “Please judge me by the enemies I have made.”
In that same spirit, I would like to say to all of you tonight: I admire Israel for the enemies it has made.
Obviously, as I’ve said before, that's not the only reason that I admire Israel, but there's a terribly important truth in Roosevelt’s statement. Let me be clear on exactly what I mean.
Israel's enemies hate her for the same reason they hate America. There's a reason that America is referred to as the "Great Satan" and Israel is referred to as "Little Satan." We both believe in self-government, we both believe in democracy, and unalienable rights.
From what I understand, the Knesset and Israel’s free, vibrant news media make Trenton seems like a cordial and sleepy atmosphere. You’ll find that hard to believe, if I say so myself.
Americans and Israelis both believe in free enterprise, accountability, in transparency, and in rewarding excellence.
We both believe in the rule of law and limits on the power of the state. We both believe in peace through strength.
Both nations have made more sacrifices for peace, and both Israel and America know that innocent civilians targeted for death by those who hate everything that we stand for and hold dear, is happening now, will happen in the future, and the only way to prevent it is for us to stand together and say no.
Since September 2000, 1,218 Israeli civilians have been killed in terror attacks. That would be the equivalent of over 48,000 Americans murdered by terrorists in the same period.
Those are some of the things that we share in common, but there is more.
Both Americans and Israelis believe – we know deep in our bones – that if the Islamic Republic of Iran acquires a nuclear weapons capability, it will be an existential threat to Israel, to America, and to world civilization itself.
A regime that radical and that malevolent – a regime that has threatened to wipe Israel off the map as soon, as late as this past weekend – in possession of the most destructive weapons on earth, would simply pose an unacceptable threat.
Even if Iran didn't use those weapons proactively, it would have the ability to blackmail nations and protect the brazen acts of its terror proxies – like Hamas and Hizbullah – in order to shape world events to its liking. It would also spark an arms race in an already volatile section of the world.
In any event, I believe, like you, that stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capability must be a top priority of the United States of America. Any president, Republican or Democrat, who allows such a thing to occur on his watch, would be acting in a way that is profoundly against the national security interests of the United States and the security interests of our friends in Israel.
It’s only by speaking the truth boldly, or by speaking the truth to power that we will prevent this from happening. It is only by decisive action by leaders who truly understand that a threat to Israel is a threat to America. A threat to the Israeli way of life is a threat to the American way of life. Not only for here in America, but for all the nations that emulate our democracy or are trying to emulate our democracy around the world.
We also must remember that in ordinary times this threat to Israel would be horrifying. But these are no ordinary times.
Simply look at the tragic events over the past few months, even the past few days in Syria and Egypt. While we all pray for and demand the safe return of the twenty American citizens being wrongly held in Egypt, or that the civilized world acts to stop the bloodshed in Syria, we must also ask: Do we need any more stark reminder that this could be one of the most volatile years along Israel’s borders since 1948?
It is. And we need to speak that truth out loud. It makes us uncomfortable. It is a difficult set of words to string together, but we know that ignoring it will not make it go away, any more than ignoring our problems at home will make them go away either.
America needs no introduction, but it is time that we start to live up to our greatness again. By telling the truth to each other, and being willing to listen to those hard truths. There is simply nothing more important if America wants to continue to lead a free and hopeful world.
So instead of closing on that, let me close on a more hopeful note.
On the 50th anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel, the great historian Paul Johnson wrote that Israel must have its place among the nations – it is not a nation like other nations, he wrote. It is and will continue to be sui generis, its people shaped by the terrible events of the 20th century, and marked by destiny. It could even be argued, Professor Johnson wrote, that the creation of Israel was the quintessential event of the 20th century.
I agree. And having America stand with Israel side-by-side, shoulder-to-shoulder, is one of the great responsibilities, and one of the great honors of the 21st century.
We need to stand for it loudly and clearly today.
It’s an extraordinary honor to be here today, and I want to tell you that the views I expressed to you tonight are ones that I feel deeply through my own personal experiences, not just my professional ones. I want you to understand that for as long as I have a place on the national stage, I will seek the truth out about what I spoke to all of you tonight in reference.
In the end, that is what we must demand of our leaders. That the truths we say in private among friends must be said in public to our enemies.
If the United States of America is going to continue to keep us to where we conduct ourselves domestically, and where we stand globally, if we are to remain a place to be admired and be emulated, we must see it from a much better world. We cannot hide from those truths. We cannot allow our leaders to look us in the eyes and try to figure out what it is they think you want to hear. And then repeat it back to you just to get through the next election.
We need to start seeking those truths out, regardless of party, regardless of place along the ideological spectrum, because whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican, you love America.
Whether you are a Democrat or a Republican, you want a world where your children and grandchildren can grow up in freedom and liberty. If America doesn’t stand with our friends, then we begin to wash our moral authority in the world, slowly and away.
I will not stand by silently and further away degrade what my parents and grandparents left me, and I hope you won’t do that either.
So this room, I’ll conclude with this. I know that on these issues of great global and moral importance, that I am preaching to the choir. And you know, preaching to choir has acquired a kind of negative connotation to it. Like you’re wasting your time.
And then, a number of years ago I heard a Lutheran minister explain preaching to the choir in a way that made me understand it for the very first time. And since that’s what I am doing tonight, I’ll explain to you as he explained it to me. He said yes I’m preaching to the choir. I have the ability to preach to the choir. I preach to the choir so they’ll sing. And for the first time I finally understood. Preaching to the choir is not a waste of time. I preach to the choir tonight at AIPAC so you’ll sing. So you’ll sing to your families and your friends, to your neighbors and co-workers, to people who are like-minded and those who we need to bring along. It is not good enough just to be in the choir unless you’re going to sing loudly and clearly and together.
I plead guilty about me preaching to the choir tonight. I don’t even want you to sing. I want through my words and my actions to earn a place in your choir as well. Thank you all very much.
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