Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), who is the vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said during an interview on Sunday that Iran’s goal was to make Israel an “unlivable” place so that it collapses.
Rubio made the remarks during a CNN interview following Iran’s attack on Saturday, which included 185 one-way suicide drones, 110 surface-to-surface missiles, and 36 cruise missiles.
“Iran’s goal has always been the same, and that is to make Israel an unlivable place,” Rubio said. “Iran knows it cannot beat Israel militarily, but what it does aspire to do is make Israel an impossible place to live and a place no one wants to visit.”
“I hear a lot of talk right now about how this was a performative attack and how none of them got through. And this is all great. It’s good that those strikes did not get through and harm anybody,” he continued. “But what do you think the tourism numbers are today in Israel and in the next couple weeks? What do we think the business numbers are going to look like? All of this is harmful to the Jewish state, because that is the goal of Iran, ultimately. And that’s why they want us out of Iraq. That’s why they want us out of Syria. That’s why they want to overthrow the king in Jordan.”
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“And that’s why they want to continue to surround Israel from Gaza, from Lebanon, they aspire one day from Jordan, from Syria, from Iraq, have all these proxies that are able — and then from Iran now — able to attack Israel and make it an unlivable place, so that the Jewish state will collapse from within economically and socially,” he added. “That is their goal. That is their aspiration. That is why many of those drones had lights on, so you could see them coming in and the terror aspect of that. And that’s what we need to understand here is that — as at the core of all of this is not simply to respond to the death of an IRGC killer, but it is also to continue to move forward on this plan to make Israel an unlivable place.”
WATCH:
Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Sen. @marcorubio tells @JakeTapper that Iran's goal is to "make Israel an unlivable place." pic.twitter.com/KPliGEE8x7
— State of the Union (@CNNSOTU) April 14, 2024