The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted Wednesday to approve the nomination of Strobe Talbott as deputy secretary of state.
The committee vote was 17-2, with Republican Sens. Jesse Helms (N.C.) and Hank Brown (Colo.) voting against the nomination.
The full Senate was expected to confirm Talbott in a vote either late Wednesday or Thursday.
The committee’s approval came against a backdrop of criticism regarding a perceived bias against Israel in some of Talbott’s past writings.
On Wednesday, before the full Senate vote, Sen. Alfonse D’Amato (R-N.Y.) held a news conference with Jewish groups opposed to the Talbott nomination.
D’Amato and Sen. Connie Mack (R-Fla.) sent a letter to President Clinton on Monday urging him to withdraw the nomination because of Talbott’s perceived bias against Israel in articles he wrote for Time magazine in the 1980s and early 1990s.
“Mr. Talbott’s writings, taken together, go beyond common criticisms to a systematic attack upon the foundations of America’s close relationship with Israel,” the letter read.
But Talbott testified at his confirmation hearing Tuesday that his views on Israel had changed since the early 1980s, when he wrote some of the articles in question in Time magazine.
The matter’s arrival before the full Senate survived an attempted delay by Helms, who proposed that the Foreign Relations Committee submit a report on the nomination, thereby postponing its consideration before the Senate.
In a partisan vote, Democratic committee members rejected Helms’ proposal over the protest of Republicans, 10-9.
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