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Do You Call The People In Los Angeles In The Nineties - Do You Call Them Rebels Or Opposition ? They Are Rebels. They Are Not Rebels Even, They Are Beheading. This Opposition, Opposing Country Or Government, By Beheading ? By Barbecuing Heads ? By Eating The Hearts Of Your Victim ? Is That Opposition ? What Do You Call The People Who Attacked The Two Towers On The 11th Of September ? Opposition ? Even If They're Not Americans, I Know This, But Some Of Them I Think Have Nationality - I Think One Of Them Has American Nationality. Do You Call Him Opposition Or Terrorist ?

-Bashar Al-Assad

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Do You Call The

Bashar Al-Assad

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Do You Call The People In Los Angeles In The Nineties - Do You Call Them Rebels Or Opposition ? They Are Rebels. They Are Not Rebels Even, They Are Beheading. This Opposition, Opposing Country Or Government, By Beheading ? By Barbecuing Heads ? By Eating The Hearts Of Your Victim ? Is That Opposition ? What Do You Call The People Who Attacked The Two Towers On The 11th Of September ? Opposition ? Even If They're Not Americans, I Know This, But Some Of Them I Think Have Nationality - I Think One Of Them Has American Nationality. Do You Call Him Opposition Or Terrorist ?

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The First Thing Syrian Refugees Want Is To Be Able To Live Within Syria. That Means Help, Humanitarian Help, The Way We Understand It, Food, Medical Care, Any Other, Let's Say, Basics For The Daily Life.

It's Not About Me, Again, This Fight Is Not My Fight, It's Not The Fight Of The Government ; It's The Fight Of The Country, Of The Syrian People.

From The First Day I Took The Decision As President To Defend My Country. So, Who Killed ? That's Another Question. Actually, The Terrorists Have Been Killing Our People Since The Beginning Of This Crisis Two Years And A Half Ago, And The Syrian People Wanted The Government And The State Institutions And The Army And The Police To Defend Them, And That's What Happened.

The Logical Thing Is To Implement The Arab Defense Agreement.

We're Not In The Area Where The Alleged Chemical Attack Happened. I Said Alleged. We're Not Sure That Anything Happened.

You Cannot Talk About Winning The War As Long As There's Killing And Destruction On Daily Basis.

To Have Or Not To Have [chemical Weapons] Is A Possibility, But To Depend On What Media Says Is Nonsense, Or To Depend On Some Of The Reports Of The Intelligence Is Nonsense And That Was Proven When They Invaded Iraq Ten Years Ago And They Said "iraq Has Stockpiles Of Wmd" And It Was Proven After The Invasion That This Was False ; It Was Fraud. So, We Can't Depend On What One Magazine Wrote.

None Of Us And None Of The Arabs Trust Israel.

It Is Difficult For Anyone To Tell You What Is Going To Happen. [middle East] Is An Area Where Everything Is On The Brink Of Explosion.

The First Thing You Have To Learn Is How To Conduct Dialogue And How To Make It Productive.

Syria Is Geographically And Politically In The Middle Of The Middle East. That Is Why We Are In Contact With Most Of The Problems Forever, Let Us Say, Whether Directly Or Indirectly.

Al-qaeda Has One Ideology And They Go Back To The Same Leadership In Afghanistan Or In Syria Or In Iraq. That's The Question. You Have Tens Of Thousands Of Foreigners, That's Definitely Correct. We Are Fighting Them On The Ground And We Know This.

When We Analyze This War In A Materialistic Way And Ask When Is It Going To End And Who Will Be The Winner And The Loser, It Means That We Do Not See The Endgame.

When You Have Terrorism, You Have A War. When You Have A War, You Always Have Innocent Lives That Could Be The Victim Of Any War, So, We Don't Have To Discuss What The Image In The West Before Discussing The Image In Syria. That's The Question.

[chemical Weapons] Isn't About What The United States Believe In, It's About The Reality That We Have, And This Reality, We Own It, We Don't Have To Discuss It.

Think Of The War Against Terrorism. In My View, Washington's Approach Can Be Compared To A Doctor Constantly Banging Away At A Tumor Instead Of Removing It Surgically.

We Are Fully Free, Not Partially, Fully Free, In Everything Related To The Future Of Syria.

This Is Reality. If [the American Officials] Want To Believe, That's Good, That Will Help Them Understand The Region And Be More Successful In Their Policies.

I Don't Have Support. Not Me ; All Syria. Every Agreement Is Between Every Class And Every Sector In Syria ; Government, People, Trade, Military, Culture, Everything ; It's Like The Cooperation Between Your Country And Any Other Country In The World. It's The Same Cooperation. It's Not About Me ; It's Not Support For The Crisis.

When You Use An Armament, You Use It To Defend The Civilians. You Kill Terrorists In Order To Defend Civilians. That's The Natural Role Of Any Army In The World.

Do You Call The People In Los Angeles In The Nineties - Do You Call Them Rebels Or Opposition ? They Are Rebels. They Are Not Rebels Even, They Are Beheading. This Opposition, Opposing Country Or Government, By Beheading ? By Barbecuing Heads ? By Eating The Hearts Of Your Victim ? Is That Opposition ? What Do You Call The People Who Attacked The Two Towers On The 11th Of September ? Opposition ? Even If They're Not Americans, I Know This, But Some Of Them I Think Have Nationality - I Think One Of Them Has American Nationality. Do You Call Him Opposition Or Terrorist ?

We Are The Fault Line; If You Don't Deal With This Fault Line, You're Going To Have An Earthquake, That's What We Always Said.

The Captain Doesn't Think About Death, Or Life, He Thinks About Saving His Ship.

Two Years And A Half And Syria Is Still Withstanding Against The United States, The West, Saudi Arabia, The Richest Countries In This Area, Including Turkey, And, Taking Into Consideration What Your Question Implies, That Even The Big Part Or The Bigger Part Of The Syrian Population Is Against Me, How Can I Withstand Till Today ? Am I The Superhuman Or Superman, Which Is Not The Case !

Fighting The Terrorists In Syria Is Not Only In The Interest Of Syria Or The Syrian People; In The Interest Of The Middle East, Of Europe Itself - Something That Many Officials In The West Don't See Or Don't Realize Or Don't Acknowledge - And In The Interest Of The Russian People, Because They Have Been Facing Terrorists For Decades Now.

Talking About Winning And Losing Is Like If You're Talking About Two Armies Fighting On Two Territories, Which Is Not The Case. Those [terrorists] Are Gangs, Coming From Abroad, Infiltrate Inhabited Areas, Kill The People, Take Their Houses, And Shoot At The Army. The Army Cannot Do The Same, And The Army Doesn't Exist Everywhere.

You Can Forge Anything These Days, And We're Living In A Fake News Era.

If You Don't Win And The Terrorists Win, Syria Wouldn't Exist Anymore.

Tayyip Erdoğan Is Megalomaniac President, He Is Not Stable. He Lives During The Ottoman Era, He Doesn't Live In The Current Time. He's Out Of Touch With The Reality.

In The War, You Lose Areas, But You Recapture Another Area. So, It Is Difficult To Tell Whether You Are Losing Or Gaining Or It Was A Standstill. No-one Has This Answer.

We Have The Precedent Of Collin Powell Ten Years Ago, When He Showed The Evidence, It Was False, And It Was Forged.

Let's Talk... We Have Indications, Let Me Just Finish This Point, Because How Can Use Wmd While Your Troops Are Only 100 Meters Away From It ? Is It Logical ? It Doesn't Happen. It Cannot Be Used Like This.

There's A Video On Youtube Where The Terrorists Clearly Make Trials [of Chemical Weapons] On A Rabbit And Kill The Rabbit And Said "this Is How We're Going To Kill The Syrian People."

There Is No Good War.

Let's Be Realistic, Every Terrorist Came To Syria, He Came Through Turkey With The Support Of [recep Tayyip] Erdogan. So, Fighting Those Terrorists Is Like Fighting The Army Of Erdogan, Not The Turkish Army, The Army Of Erdogan.

Trust That The Thing In Life That Excites You The Most Comes Complete With All The Tools Necessary To Support You In The Doing Of That Thing. It Is Automatic; It Is Built In. All You Need To Do Is Act On The Opportunities That Doing That Situation Brings To You.

Our Democracy Should Reflect Our Culture And Our Habits And Our Customs And Our Reality At The Same Time.

The U.s. And Britain Are Incapable Of Controlling All Of Iraq.

Whatever The American Officials Said About The Conflicts In Syria In General Has No Credibility. Whatever They Say, It's Just Lies And, Let's Say, Bubbles, Has No Foundation On The Ground.

You Cannot Import Anything From Outside Your Country Regarding The Future Of Your Country.

Anyone Who's Not Military Knows This Fact. Why Do You Use Chemical Weapons While You're Advancing ?

Israel Has Wmd, And It Has To Sign [chemical Warfare Agreement], And Israel Is Occupying Our Land, So That's We Talked About The Middle East, Not Syria, Not Israel ; It Should Be Comprehensive.

You Cannot Be Desperate When The Army Is Making Advances. That Should Have Happened - If We Take Into Consideration That This Presumption Is Correct And This Is Reality - You Use It When You're In A Desperate Situation.

Desperate Situations

If You Want To Kill The Syrian People, Who's Going To Support Us As A Government, As Officials? No One.

Any Cooperation That Doesn't Go Through The Syrian Government Is Not Legal. If It's Not Legal, We Cannot Cooperate With, And We Don't Recognize And We Don't Accept.

We're Not Sure That If There's Chemical Weapon Used And Who Used It. We Can't Talk About Virtual Things, We Have To Talk About Facts.

What The Army Is Doing Is Cleaning Those Areas, And The Indication That The Army Is Strong Is That It's Making Advancement In That Area. It Never Went To One Area And Couldn't Enter To It - That's An Indication. How Could That Army Do That If It's A Family Army Or A Sect Army ? What About The Rest Of The Country Who Support The Government ? It's Not Realistic, It Doesn't Happen. Otherwise, The Whole Country Will Collapse.

This War [in Syria] Is Going To Support Al-qaeda And The Same People That Killed Americans In The 11th Of September. The Second Thing That We Want To Tell Congress, That They Should Ask And That What We Expect Them To Ask This Administration About The Evidence That They Have Regarding The Chemical Story And Allegations That They Presented.

We Can Have National Dialogue Where Different Syrian Parties Sit And Discuss The Future Of Syria. You Can Have Interim Government Or Transitional Government. Then You Have Final Elections, Parliamentary Elections, And You're Going To Have Presidential Elections.

From The First Day I Took The Decision As President To Defend My Country.

I Would Say I Need Two Things: The First One Is To Be Objective In Every Statement He Could Make Regarding Any Conflict Around The World, Including Syria. The Second One Is Not To Turn Secretary-general Office Into A Part Or Branch Of The State Department Of The United States.

It Is Not My Democracy As A Person; It Is Our Democracy As A Society.

Hizbullah Is Not A Militia.

I Don't Believe In War, I Believe In The Principle Of Deterrence.

[a Conflict Of Sunni Vs. Shia] Is In The Mind Of The Saudis, And This Is In The Minds Of The Wahabists. [the Iranians] Actually What They Are Doing Is The Opposite. They Tried To Open Channels With The Saudi, With Many Other Islamic Entities In The Region In Order To Talk About Islamic Society, Not Sunni And Shi'ite Societies.

Iran Doesn't Have Any Soldier In Syria, So How Could Iran Help Me ?

[the Jews] Tried To Kill The Principles Of All Religions With The Same Mentality In Which They Betrayed Jesus Christ And The Same Way They Tried To Betray And Kill The Prophet Muhammad.

We Don't Say That We Don't Have It, We're Still Secular In Syria, But With The Time, This Secularism Will Be Eroded.

We Wouldn't Have Withstood For Two Years And A Half. We Would Have Disintegration Of The Army, Disintegration Of The Whole Institution In The State ; We Would Have Disintegration Of Syria If That Was The Case. It Can't Be Tolerated In Syria. I'm Talking About The Normal Reaction Of The People. If It's Not A National Army, It Cannot Have The Support, And If It Doesn't Have The Public Support Of Every Sect, It Cannot Do Its Job And Advance Recently. It Cannot. The Army Of The Family Doesn't Make National War.

I Am President, I Don't Own The Country So They Are Not My Forces.

In Reality, You Cannot Withstand For Five Years And More Against All Those Countries, The West, And The Gulf States, The Petrodollars, And All This Propaganda, The Strongest Media Corporations Around The World, If You Don't Have The Support Of Your Own People. That's Against The Reality.

Freedom And Democracy Are Nothing But Instruments, Just Like Stability. The Goal Is Called Progress And Growth. Anyone Who Puts Freedom Ahead Of Stability Is Hurting Growth.

We Have Agreements With Many Countries Including Iran, Including Russia, Including Other Countries That Are About Different Things Including Armament. It's Cooperation Like Any Cooperation Between Any Two Countries, Which Is Normal. It's Not Related To The Crisis.

I Think The Most Important Part Of This Now Is, Let's Say The American People, But The Polls Show That The Majority Now Don't Want A War, Anywhere, Not Only Against Syria.

The External Support Can Never Substitute Internal Support, The Example That We Have To Look At Very Well Is Egypt And Tunisia ; They Have All The Support From The West And From The Gulf And From Most Of The Countries Of The World. When They Don't Have Support Within Their Country, They Couldn't Continue More Than - How Many Weeks ? - Three Weeks. So, The Only Reason We Stand Here For Two Years And A Half Is Because We Have Internal Support, Public Support.

Countries Of The World

In Any War, People Will Pay The Price.

My Country And Me, We Are Part Of This Region, We're Not Separated. We Cannot Discuss It As Syria Or As Me ; It Should Be As Part, As A Whole, As Comprehensive. That's How We Have To Look At It.

If You Want To Be Transparent With Your People, Do Not Do Anything Cosmetic, Whether To Deceive Your People Or To Get Some Applaud From The West.

[barack] Obama Can Draw Lines For Himself And His Country, Not For Other Countries. We Have Our Red Lines, Like Our Sovereignty, Our Independence, While If You Want To Talk About World Red Lines, The United States Used Depleted Uranium In Iraq, Israel Used White Phosphorus In Gaza, And Nobody Said Anything. What About The Red Lines ? We Don't See Red Lines. It's Political Red Lines.

We Are Against Any Wmd, Any Weapons Of Mass Destruction, Whether Chemical Or Nuclear.

Mass Destruction

Did The President Order Anyone To Kill Civilians, Did He Order The Destruction, Did He Order Supporting Terrorism In His Country? Of Course Not.

Terrorists Have Been Supported By Tens Of Foreign Countries, So Syria Alone Wouldn't Be Able To Face This Kind Of War Without The Help Of Its Friends.

Syria Is In A State Of War Since Its Land Was Occupied For More Than Four Decades, And The Nature Of The Frontier In Syria Implies That Most Of The Army Is In Inhabited Areas, Most Of The Centers Are In Inhabited Areas.

Nobody Knows [who They Are] Because When [terrorists] Are Dead And They Are Killed, They Don't Have Any Id.

We're Talking About The Responsibility, My Responsibility According To The Syrian Constitution That Said We Have To Defend Ourselves.

We Were On The Way To Democracy. We Didn't Say That We Are Fully Democratic, We Were On The Way, We Were Moving Forward. Slowly Or Fast, That's Subjective, Cannot Be Objective, That's Always Subjective. But We're Moving Forward In That Regard.

You Have To Look At The Reality In Syria. Whenever We Liberate Any City Or Village From The Terrorists, The Civilians Will Go Back To The City, While They Flee That City When The Terrorists Attack That Area, The Opposite. So, They Flee, First Of All, The War Itself; They Flee The Area Under The Control Of The Terrorists, They Flee The Difficult Situation Because Of The Embargo By The West On Syria.

Difficult Situations

It's A Dangerous Thing When Someone Gets Up In The Morning And Has Nothing To Eat.

John Kerry Presented His Confidence And His Convictions. It's Not About Confidence, It's About Evidence. The Russians Have Completely Opposite Evidence That The Missiles Were Thrown From An Area Where The Rebels Control. This Reminds Me - What Kerry Said - About The Big Lie That Collin Powell Said In Front Of The World On Satellites About The Wmd In Iraq Before Going To War. He Said "this Is Our Evidence."

We've Been Dealing With This Kind Of Terrorism Since The Fifties, Since The Muslim Brotherhood Came To Syria At That Time.

Sometimes You May Kill Tens Of Thousands Or Hundreds Of Thousands With Very Primitive Armaments.

The Armament Of The Government Is Legal Armament. Any Other Armament Is Not Legal.

In The End A Lie Is A Lie.

I Think The Congress Is Elected By People, It Represents The People, And Works For Their Interest. The First Question That They Should Ask Themselves : What Do Wars Give America, Since Vietnam Till Now ? Nothing. No Political Gain, No Economic Gain, No Good Reputation.

Why Should You Use A Term [rebels] In The United States And England And Maybe Other Countries And Use Another Term In Syria ? This Is A Double Standard That We Don't Accept.

The Army Is Making Good Advancement On Daily Basis Against The Terrorists. Of Course, They Still Have The Support Of Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia And Some Western Countries Including The United States, But The Only Option That We Have In That Regard Is To Win.

My Primary Goal Is To Create Prosperity.

A Bomb Is A Bomb, What's The Difference Between Different Kinds Of Bombs? All Bombs Are To Kill, But It's About How To Use It.

When Our Interests Matched, The Americans Have Been Good To Us, And When The Interests Differed, They Wanted Us To Mold Ourselves To Them, Which We Refused.

You Hardly Find Any Military Base In Distant Areas From The [syria] Cities Unless It's An Airport Or Something Like This, But Most Of The Military Bases Or Centers Within Inhabited Areas.

No Government In The World Kills Its People, Unless It's Led By A Crazy Person.

From Our Side, From Our Part As Government, We Have Two Missions: The First One Is To Fight Those Terrorists To Liberate That Area [eastern Part Of Aleppo] And The Civilians From Those Terrorists, And At The Same Time To Try To Find A Solution To Evacuate That Area From Those Terrorists If They Accept, Let's Say, What You Call It Reconciliation Option, In Which They Either Give Up Their Armaments For Amnesty, Or They Leave That Area.

There's A Difference Between A Mistake Or Even A Crime That's Been Committed By An Individual, And Between A Policy Of Crime That's Been Implemented Or Adopted By A Government.

In Aleppo We Had The Missile Itself, And The Material, And The Sample From The Sand, From The Soil, And Samples From The Blood [of Chemical Weapons].

You Cannot Have Partition Only On Political Bases Or Geographic Bases. It Should Be Social First Of All When The Communities Do Not Live With Each Other.

There's A Difference Between Responsibility Of The Policy And Responsibility Of The Practice. In Any Practice, You Have Malpractice, That's Another Issue. When You Talk About State And President, You Always Talk About The Decisions And The Policy.

Our Soldiers In Another Area Were Attacked Chemically. Our Soldiers - They Went To The Hospital As Casualties Because Of Chemical Weapons, But In The Area Where They Said The Government Used Chemical Weapons, We Only Had Video And We Only Have Pictures And Allegations. We're Not There ; Our Forces, Our Police, Our Institutions Don't Exist There. How Can You Talk About What Happened If You Don't Have Evidence ?

You Look At [terrorists] Faces, They Look Foreigners, But Where Are They Coming From ? How Precise This Estimate Is Difficult To Tell, But Definitely The Majority Are Al-qaeda.

We, In Syria, Our Point Of View Stems From Our Experience.

[american's Government] Thinking They Are The Judge Of The World; They're Not.

Any Strike Will Be As Direct Support To Al-qaeda Offshoot That's Called Jabhat Al-nusra And The Islamic State Of Iraq And Syria. You're Right About This. It's Going To Be Direct Support.

We Said [u.s] Are Going To Be Repercussions Of The Mistaken Way Of Dealing With It, Of Treating The Terrorism, But Nobody Expected 11th Of September. So, You Cannot Expect. It Is Difficult For Anyone To Tell You What Is Going To Happen. It's An Area Where Everything Is On The Brink Of Explosion. You Have To Expect Everything.

"winning" Is A Subjective Word, But We Are Making Advancement. This Is The Correct Word, Because Winning For Some People Is When You Finish Completely.

America Is Interested In Re-arranging The Region As It Sees Fit.

When You're In The Middle Of A Storm, Leaving Your Country Just Because You Have To Leave Without Any Reasonable Reason, It Means You're Quitting Your Country And This Is Treason.

That's The Problem With The American Position; They Think That They Are The Police Of The World.

Those Fighters, The Syrian Part That You're Talking About, Lost Its Natural Incubators In The Syrian Society - They Don't Have Incubators Anymore ; That's Why They Have Incubators Abroad. They Need Money From Abroad, They Need Moral Support And Political Support From Abroad. They Don't Have Any Grassroots, Any Incubator. So, When You Stop The Smuggling, We Don't Have Problems.

The Problem With The West Is That They Start With Political Reform Going Towards Democracy. If You Want To Go Towards Democracy, The First Thing Is To Involve The People In Decision Making, Not To Make It.

First Of All, When You Have A Doctor Who Cut The Leg To Prevent The Patient From The Gangrene If You Have To, We Don't Call Butcher ; You Call Him A Doctor, And Thank You For Saving The Lives.

We Never Said That The Majority [of The Terrorists] Are Not Syrians, But We Said That The Minority Is What They Call "free Syrian Army." That's What We Said.

We Are Facing An External Attack Against Us, Which Is More Dangerous Than Any Other Previous Wars... We Are Dealing With Those Who Are Extremists, Who Only Know The Language Of Killing And Criminality.

Israeli Interests Are Not Necessarily In Harmony With The American Interests.

It Should Be Known That Israel Is Based On Treachery.

I Have To Be Very Clear And Very Honest. I'm Not Asking [ The American Officials] To Believe If They Don't Want To Believe. This Is Reality, I'm Telling You The Reality From Our Country. We Live Here, We Know What Is Happening, And They Have To Listen To People Here. They Cannot Listen Only To Their Media Or To Their Research Centers. They Don't Live Here ; No One Lives Here But Us.

Since Its Very Inception, Israel Has Been A Threat.

António Guterres Role As Secretary-general In Bringing All Powers Together Is Very Essential` And We Hope He Can Succeed, It's Not Easy Of Course.

At The End, Killing Is Killing. Massacring Is Massacring.

This Is Where We Can Discuss The Evidence [of The Chemical Weapons ], But He Doesn't Have It. He Didn't Present It Because He Doesn't Have It, Kerry Doesn't Have It. No One In Your Administration Has It. If They Had It, They Would Have Presented It To You As Media From The First Day.

Despite The Ethnic Diversity Within Each Nation, The Social Fabric Of The Region By And Large Is One.

The Israeli Lobby Has Clout In The U.s., Which Means That Re-arranging The Region And Controlling Its Resources One Way Or Another, Will Serve Israel Through Its Control Over The American Administration.

But For Us, In Syria, We Have Principles. We'll Do Anything To Prevent The Region From Another Crazy War. It's Not Only Syria. Because It Will Start In Syria.

You Have Different Parties, Different Factions, You Have Different Ideologies ; You Have Everything In Middle East Region Now.

It Is Even More So When It Comes To Iraq, Which Is A Large Arab Country With Scientific, Material, And Human Resources And Is Able To Accomplish, At The Least, What Lebanon Accomplished, And More.

When You Talk About Cooperation, It Means Cooperation Between Two Legal Governments, Not Cooperation Between Foreign Government And Any Faction Within Syria.

In The Initiative That We Issued At The Beginning Of Year 2013 We Said Every Party With No Exceptions As Long As They Give Up Their Armaments.

You Said Treaties, And A Russian Official Said ; We Have Not Agreement... Contracts, That We Have To Fulfill, And Those Contracts Are Like Any Country ; You Buy Armaments, You Buy Anything You Want.

The United States' Credibility Is At An All-time Low. So, This War Is Against The Interest Of The Untied States.

There Can Be No Peace Without Unity.

I'm Not Talking About Him; I'm Talking About The Countries That Go To Support [antonio] Guterres Plan, Because He Needs The Support Of Other Countries, He Cannot Achieve That Plan While Many Countries In The World Are Still Supporting The Terrorists In Syria. So, Of Course We Support It, Whether Helping The People To Live, To Go Back To Their Country, And To Live In Security Without Terrorists.

Under Syrian Law, A Journalist Is Not Allowed To Report On Military Matters. This May Be Wrong Or Right, But That's Just The Way It Is.

[it Is Important] To Have Stability And To Have Security, Which Means Humanitarian Equals Fighting Terrorists. You Cannot Talk About Humanitarian Aid And Supporting The Terrorists At The Same Time. You Cannot, You Have To Choose.

In The Eighties, We Asked For International Coalition Against Terrorism After The Muslim Brotherhood Crisis In Syria When They Started Killing, Of Course They Were Defeated At That Time. We Asked For The Same Thing. So, This Is A Long-term Policy That We Base Our Policy On For Years Now.

I Don't Want To Talk About Methods Of Killing. But What Is The Difference Between A Bomb Worn On The Body And One Dropped From An Airplane? Both Of Them Kill People.

The Majority Of Fighters Now Are Al-qaeda. If You Want To Support Them, You Are Supporting Al-qaeda, You Are Creating Havoc In The Region, And If This Region Is Not Stable, The Whole World Cannot Be Stable.

From Russia For Example, We Have Political Support, Which Is Different From The Cooperation. We Have Cooperation For 60 Years Now, But Now We Have Political Support.

Revolution Should Be Syrian, Cannot Be Revolution Imported From Abroad.

My Decision Was, And The Decision Of The Different Institutions, And The Decision Of The Different Officials In Syria - I'm On Top Of Them - Was To Have Dialogue, To Fight Terrorists, And To Reform As A Response At The Very Beginning, Response To The Allegations, Let's Say, At That Time, That They Needed Reform In Syria, We Responded.

We're Talking About One Region, Bigger Regions, Not Only About Syria. This Interlinked Region, This Intermingled, Interlocked, Whatever You Want To Call It ; If You Strike Somewhere, You Have To Expect The Repercussions Somewhere Else In Different Forms In Ways You Don't Expect.

If There Is Any Change Regarding That Hope, We Should Ask The Syrian People, Not Anyone Else In The World.

In The United States, They Always Talk About Subtitles, About Chapters In A Book Without Taking The Main Title Of The Book. They Talk About A Subtitle In A Chapter And If You Ask Them About The Headline, The Main Title, They Say They Do Not Know.

The United States Accused Syria, And Because You Accused You Have To Bring Evidence [of Chemical Weapons], This First Of All. We Have To Find Evidences When We Are There.

Before The 11th Of September, In My Discussions With Many Officials Of The United States, Some Of Them Are Congressmen, I Used To Say That "don't Deal With Terrorists As Playing Games." It's A Different Story. You're Going To Pay The Price If You're Not Wise In Dealing With Terrorists.

The American Officials Should Learn To Deal With Reality. Why Did The United States Fail In Most Of Its Wars ? Because It Always Based Its Wars On The Wrong Information. So, Whether They Believe Or Not, This Is Not Reality.

If The Rebels Or The Terrorists In This Region Or Any Other Group Have [chemical Warfare], This Could Happen, I Don't Know. I'm Not A Fortuneteller To Tell You What's Going To Happen.

It's Not Exactly Fair To Make A Mistake Yourself And Then Start Blaming Others For It.

Worry Does Not Mean Fear, But Readiness For The Confrontation.

Many Syrians Understand That The Only Way To Protect Your Country Is To Live With Each Other With Integration, Not Only In Coexistence, Which Is Actually More Precise To Call Cohabitation, When People Interact And Integrate With Each Other On Daily Basis In Every Detail. So, I Think In This Regard I Am More Assured That Syria Will Be More Unified. So, The Only Problem Now That We Face Is Not The Partition, But Terrorism.

If You Ask Americans Whether They've Been Successful At Sealing The Border With Mexico, They'll Tell You That It's A Very Difficult Proposition.

The Criteria Or The Paradigm For Us Is Not The West, Not The Western Paradigm, Because The West Has Its Own Culture, We Have Our Own Culture, They Have Their Own Reality, We Have Our Own Reality.

It Started Partly As A Sectarian War In Some Areas, But Now It's Not, Because When You Talk About Sectarian War Or Religious War, You Should Have A Very Clear Line Between The Sects And Religions In Syria According To The Geography And The Demography In Syria, Something We Don't Have.

It's Our Right To Defend Our Country Against Any Kind Of Invasion.

Today, The Iraqi Citizen Sees That America Is Coming And Wants To Occupy His Country And Kill Him, And He Is Willing To Experience For Himself What Happened In Palestine.

The Hope For An American Is Different From The Hope Of A Syrian. For Me, I Should Be The Hope Of The Syrian, Not Any Other One, Not American, Neither French, Nor Anyone In The World. I'm President To Help The Syrian People.

We Can Say, You Can Win The War Only When You Restore Stability In Syria.

With The Time, Yes We Can Be Worried, Because The Secular State Should Reflect Secular Society, And This Secular Society, With The Time, If You Don't Get Rid Of Those Terrorists And These Extremists And The Wahabi Style, Of Course It Will Influence At Least The New And The Coming Generations.

Secular Society

As Far As We Are Concerned, We Syria Have Not Changed.

These People That Started Here, They Support The Government Now Against Those Rebels. Why Talking About What Happened At The Very Beginning Is Completely Different From What Is Happening Now - It's Not The Same. There's Very High Dynamic, Things Are Changing On Daily Basis. It's A Completely Different Image. Those People Who Wanted Revolution, They Are Cooperating With Us.

As We See Now The American Officials, They Say Something In The Morning And They Do The Opposite In The Evening. So, You Cannot Judge Those People According To What They Say. You Cannot Take Them At Their Words, To Be Frank.

I Wouldn't Tell The President [barack Obama] Or Any Other Official, Because We Are Disappointed By Their Behavior Recently, Because We Expected This Administration To Be Different From Bush's Administration. They Are Adopting The Same Doctrine With Different Accessories.

If The American Administration Want To Support Al-qaeda - Go Ahead. That's What We Have To Tell Them, Go Ahead And Support Al-qaeda, But Don't Talk About Rebels And Free Syrian Army.

Personally, I Do Not Support The Concept Of Suicide Bombings. This Is Not Part Of Our [syrian] Culture. But Whether You Condemn Them Or Not, Suicide Bombings Are A Reality.

The Problem Is Not The Occupation, But How People Deal With It.

You Cannot Reform Your Society Or Institution Without Opening Your Mind.

The Problem With The West Is That They Start With Political Reform Going Towards Democracy.

How Can You Be Afraid To Feel? Isn't Fear A Feeling? If You're Feeling Fear, You've Felt One Of The Most Negative Emotions There Is To Feel. Everything Else Should Be A Piece Of Cake. Feel Good, Feel Happy, Feel Healthy, Feel Loved, Feel Abundant, Feel Creative, Feel Compassionate, Feel Knowledgeable, Feel Powerful.

I Said We Don't Pin A Lot Of Hopes Of Changing Administrations [in U.s.] Because That Context Has Been Going On For More Than Fifty Years Now, And That's Expected. If They Want To Continue In The Same Position Of The United States Creating Problems Around The World, That's What They Have To Do: Only Interfering In The Matters Of Other Nations.

I Don't Believe That In A Couple Of Months Erdogan And The United States Regime, And The Western Regimes In General, And Of Course Saudi Arabia And Qatar, Are Going To Stop The Support Of The Terrorists.

We Have To Wait And See When Donald J. Trump Embarks His New Mission, Let's Say, Or Position Within This Administration As President.

Whether You Call It Terrorism Or Resistance, And Whether You Like Hamas Or Not, It Is A Political Entity That No One Can Ignore.

We Asked For A Delegation [of The Red Cross] In March 2013 When The First Attack Happened In Aleppo In The North Of Syria ; They Delayed It Till Just A Few Days Before Al-ghouta When They Sent Those Team, And The Team Itself Said In Its Report That He Did Everything As He Wanted. There Was Not A Single Obstacle.

When You Talk About Humanitarian, It Doesn't Only Mean To Offer The People The Help, The Food, Their Necessary Needs For Their Life. The First Thing, If You Ask The Syrian Refugees, For Example, The First Thing They Want Is To Go Back To Their Country.

I Believe That The United States Is Not Genuine Regarding Having A Cessation Of Violence In Syria.

Some Of These Agendas Wanted Me To Quit, Very Simply, So They Said "we Have All The Guarantees If You Want To Leave, And All The Money And Everything You Want." Of Course, You Just Ignore That.

We Don't Discuss This Issue [ Chemical Weapons ] In Public Because We Never Said That We Have It, And We Never Said That We Don't Have It. It's A Syrian Issue ; It's A Military Issue We Never Discuss In Public With Anyone.

Any American Strike Will Not Destroy As Much As The Terrorists Have Already Destroyed In Syria ; Sometimes The Repercussions Could Be Many Doubles The Strike Itself.

We've Been Living In Difficult Circumstances And We Prepare Ourselves For Every Possibility. But That Doesn't Mean If You're Prepared Things Will Be Better ; It's Going To Get Worse With Any Foolish Strike Or Stupid War.

The Question Is Who Threw Chemicals On The Same Day On Our Soldiers. That's The Same Question. Technically, Not The Soldiers. Soldiers Don't Throw Missiles On Themselves. So, Either The Rebels, The Terrorists, Or A Third Party. We Don't Have Any Clue Yet.

Look At The Results Of Regime Change In Iraq. You Can't Possibly Claim That It Was Successful.

We Are Worried That Rebels Are Taking Control In Many Countries, And Look At The Results Now. Are You Satisfied As An American ? What Are The Results ? Nothing. Very Bad - Nothing Good.

Foreigners Cannot Bring Freedom, Cannot Bring Democracy, Because This Is Related To The Culture, To The Different Factors That Affect Or Influence That Society. You Cannot Bring It, You Cannot Import It.

For Turkey, They Think That If The Muslim Brotherhood Take Over The Rest Of The Region, They Will Be Very Comfortable, They Will Be Very Happy, They Will Make Sure That Their Political Future Is Guaranteed.

The Sarin Gas Is A Very Primitive Gas. You Can Have It Done In The Backyard Of A House ; It's A Very Primitive Gas. So, It's Not Something Complicated.

This Is Cooperation [with Hezbollah, Iran , From Russia], I Don't Know What You Mean By Support. We Have Cooperation With Countries For Decades. Why Talk About This Cooperation Now ?

I Think Sadness Prevails In Syria Now. We Don't Feel Anything Else But Sadness Because We Have This Killing Every Day, Whether With Chemical Or Any Other Kind.

The Problem With Every American Candidate Regarding The Presidency, I Am Not Talking Only About This Campaign Or Elections, But Generally, That They Say Something During The Campaign And They Do The Opposite After The Campaign.

Terrorism Is A State Of Mind That On The One Hand Has To Do With Ignorance And, On The Other Hand, Can Be Attributed To A Feeling Of Desperation Over The Political Situation, Which At Some Point Takes The Form Of Revenge.

Of Course, When Secretary-general Is Objective, He Can Play An Important Role In Dealing With Different Officials In The United Nations In Order To Bring The Policies Of The Different States - Mainly Russia And The United States - Toward More Cooperation And More Stability Regarding Syria.

History Teaches Us That Nobody Can Prevent A Resistance Group From Arming When It Has The Support Of The People.

I Am Syrian, I Was Made In Syria, I Have To Live In Syria And Die In Syria.

That's All Before The Crisis. We Always Have This Kind Of Cooperation With Iran [supplies, Weaponry].

[hezbollah Forces] Cannot Exist All Over Syria Anyway, For Many Reasons, But They Exist On The Borders.

Peace In Syria Is Not Only Our Priority; It's A Middle Eastern Priority, And When The Middle East Is Stable, The Rest Of The World Is Stable, Because The Middle East Is The Heart Of The World Geographically And Geopolitically, And Syria Is The Heart Of The Middle East Geographically And Geopolitically.

When You Talk About Al-qaeda It Doesn't Matter If He's Syrian Or American Or From Europe Or From Asia Or Africa.

As Soon As The Legitimate Lebanese Government Is Convinced That The Conditions Have Ripened And That Lebanon Is Able To Maintain Stability On Its Own... Then, The Syrian Forces Will Return To Their Homeland.

Circumstances Don't Matter, Only My State Of Being Matters. What State Of Being Are You Choosing?

America Must Listen. It Must Listen To The Interests Of Others. But The Us Government Has No Interest In Similarities, No Matter How Obvious.

The Fact That There Are People Who Criticize Me Doesn't Mean That People Hate Me.

We Are Very Cautious In Judging [donald Trump], Especially As He Wasn't In A Political Position Before.

Many People Do Not Understand The Difference Between Peace And A Peace Treaty. If You Want To Have Real Peace With Normal Relations Between People, You Need To Have Comprehensive Peace.

Whenever You Have A War, The Civilians And The Innocents Will Pay The Price. That's In Any War, Any War Is A Bad War.

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