Washington, DC -- Congressman Eliot Engel (D-NY-17) issued the following statement in response to the deadly attack on a bus in Southern Israel by armed terrorists.  Israel said the Palestinian assailants, from Hamas-ruled Gaza, crossed into Israel from the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt and killed seven people.

“The United States stands shoulder to shoulder with the Israeli people, as must the rest of the world.  Until Palestinians cease using terrorism, there cannot be peace in the Middle East, nor a Palestinian state.  Countries around the world should remember this before voting in the United Nations General Assembly on the Palestinian request for recognition of their statehood next month.  Premeditated acts of terrorism are not the path to acceptance by the international community.  The violence must stop, and must stop now.  We should all keep the victims of this senseless attack, and their families, in our thoughts and prayers.”

Rep. Eliot L. Engel is a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.  He recently authored amendments which were accepted unanimously by the Committee to condition assistance to the Palestinian Authority on ending incitement and halting efforts toward U.N. recognition or unilateral declaration of statehood.

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