Politics & Power Quote by Don Nickles

The line reads like moral clarity, but it functions as political architecture: a way to pre-authorize force while sounding like a civics lesson. Don Nickles, a long-serving Republican senator from Oklahoma, isn’t offering a novel ethical claim so much as invoking a consensus posture in Washington. “Independent and sovereign” does extra work here. It’s a credentialing phrase, meant to settle an argument before it starts: if Israel is a normal nation-state, then the default entitlement to self-defense follows, and the speaker can frame subsequent policy choices as straightforward rather than contested.

The subtext lives in what’s left unspecified. “Defend itself” is elastic; it can cover narrow, immediate protection of civilians or broad military campaigns with significant humanitarian consequences. By keeping the target and scale undefined, the statement invites listeners to project their preferred version of “defense” onto it. That ambiguity is useful in Congress, where rhetorical alignment often matters as much as legislative detail.

“I have always thought” signals consistency, not inquiry. It’s a preemptive shield against accusations of opportunism, especially in moments when Middle East violence spikes and public scrutiny intensifies. The intent is less to weigh competing rights than to set the terms of debate: start from Israel’s legitimacy and security needs, and treat criticism as secondary, conditional, or potentially suspect.

Contextually, Nickles’ era in the Senate overlaps with decades of bipartisan pro-Israel positioning shaped by Cold War strategy, evangelical politics, and organized advocacy. The sentence is a reliable refrain in that ecosystem: a values-based soundbite designed to make a complicated conflict legible in one safe, vote-ready principle.