President Al-Assad: the Warrior against Terrorism

[Bleipriester]

Terrorism is has never been a Syrian Phenomenon; extremist Islamic matrices have characterized this unfortunately international phenomenon. Syria has faced and defeated a frenzy terrorist phenomenon by Moslem Brotherhood gangs by the end of the seventies and beginning of the eighties of the last century. Actually some of those who supported such a frenzy phenomenon are themselves the same now who support the ongoing terrorism against Syrians, particularly some ewes, Jordan and the USA. The Late President Hafez Al-Assad was able to lead the battle of all Syrians against terrorism and to put an end to terrorism against Syrians. Syria, a secular peaceful country under the only secular leadership in this part of the world, since the beginning of the 21st Century once more has been the target of terrorism. This very terrorism under many forms: occupation, threats, sanctions, derailed the ambitious plans of reforms and modernization, not to mention the heavy losses inflicted on all sectors of Syrian life. The US-made terrorism and Wahabi exported terrorism from dozens of countries mushroomed and escalated. Foolishly, Israel the occupier of the Arab land, embraced, hosted and sponsored by itself this terrorism! Here comes the historic role and leadership of the Syrian Army and its Supreme Commander, President Bashar Hafez Al-Assad, the man who has been defending heroically not only his country, the region but the whole world against terrorism.
H.E. President Bashar Hafez Al-Assad is indeed the world number one man in combating terrorism; he has been in words as well as in deeds leading every effort as to outline, define , combat and eradicate terrorism. Among the points to be highlighted to this effect and for this noble purpose are:
“The Israelis have a real peace-phobia; hence those who perpetrate crimes can never be good at the making of peace. Just like thieves who steal something are not used to return willingly what they have stolen; that is they do not return the rights, but only if they are compelled to do so. This is the essence of resistance, which the resistance men very well have understood; their resistance has become the way for peace, which restores the rights from the enemy, which understands but the language of force. Here lies the difference between the resistance and terrorism, the first is Arabic while the second- terrorism- is an Israeli one. The first wants peace, the second wants war; the first was obliged to fight in defense of his rights, the second has been built on killing and aggressions against others,”
"This- the Israeli aggression against Gaza- is like sowing the seeds of extremism around the region, in the Arab and Muslim Worlds,"
"Desperation breeds extremism. Extremism will produce terrorism,"
"This - the situation in Gaza- is a political crisis combined with a humanitarian crisis. You have to solve them, otherwise you will sow the seeds of extremism."
"The effect of war is more dangerous than war... sowing seeds of extremism and terror around the region,"
“How did Hamas come to its position in the government? By election. And this election was supervised by Europeans and by Americans, including ex-President Jimmy Carter. And they said, this is a democratic election. So the question, how could you have a terrorist organization elected democratically? They have to revise this contradiction. This means the whole people are terrorists and it doesn't work. You cannot accuse the whole people as terrorist people.”
“I have always warned against terrorism and affirmed over the past few years that mistaken policies towards our region ensured fertile soil for terrorism. But that doesn’t discourage us. We shall continue to pursue our internal and external policies opposed to occupation, violence and terrorism. This attack impels us, once again, to join our efforts to combat the scourge of terrorism and ensure the conditions of a peaceful life for all citizens.”
“I have always warned against terrorism, asserting that the wrong policies regarding our region do create the fertile soil for terrorism,”
“After 9/11, we started the first cooperation between Syria and the USA in the security field. One of their messages was about a terrorist called Maher Arar who was coming to Syria, and they wanted Syria to catch him because he is al-Qaeda member. We caught him according to American information, and we trusted the information at that time. So, we put him in prison. After the investigation, we arrived at the conclusion that he is not an al-Qaeda member, so we freed him. He accused Syria, and Canada accused Syria, while they must accuse the USA. This is the price of cooperating with the USA! So, we don't have anything to do with him.”
“Terrorism is on of the present challenges facing us. While we condemn the terrorist acts targeting the innocent and assert our decisive stance against terrorism; we reiterate that resistance against occupation is but the legitimate right for all people guaranteed by international conventions and human norms. We, further, reiterate that the Israeli state terrorism against our Arab people represents the ugliest form of terrorism in the modern age.”
"We condemn every action carried out by the PKK against the Turkish Civilians or against the Turkish soldiers who are defending the borders of the country. AS we think, any peaceful and political solution for any problem is the best. I believe the Turkish Government itself is with the same line . I do not think that the Turkish Government is seeking war."
“Actually, first of all I took the initiative after Sept.11th to help the Americans. Why? Because we have the notion for decades that this terrorism, if it attacks, let us say, in your country in the United States, in East Asia, in Africa, some day it will attack Syria. So terrorism is like the internet, has no borders.”
“What happened in New York may happen in Syria. So that is why we said we have to move now because we tried in the eighties to convince some European countries that we have to make coalition against terrorism. At that time nobody cared about what we said. Because now after the eleventh of September most of the world is convinced about this idea, we said let us move. So we started this cooperation and we told them. I told one of the CIA officials, you have the information, but we have the knowledge because as you said we defeated those.”
“But it is not a matter of organization as you call it or person or group. It is a state of mind. We have to know the culture to know how to fight the state of mind, because those terrorists use any cause and assume it as a mantle to make terrorist acts. So we know what mantle they assume and we know how to fight this and how to deal with it. They committed many mistakes in the United States regarding the security issue. But this was not the main reason. The main reason is that you cannot have the good, normal and sophisticated kind of cooperation between the intelligence and at the same time you have animosity in the political field. So we either have normal relations across the board as a package or let us stop this cooperation.”
“In addition to the exploitation of this phenomena, namely terrorism, as a tool in the hands of some powers which claim fighting terrorism in order to intimidate and terrorize the others and attack their cultures, identities and intervene in their internal affairs .”


Dr. Mohammad Abdo Al-Ibrahim

syriatimes.sy - President Al-Assad: the Warrior against Terrorism (4)