Ed Royce: “I acknowledge the ranking member, Mr. Eliot Engel from New York, for his outstanding leadership on this legislation.…”

“I acknowledge the ranking member, Mr. Eliot Engel from New York, for his outstanding leadership on this legislation. With its passage today, his H.R. 1493, the Protect and Preserve International Cultural Property Act, will head to the President's desk for his signature. This is a critical measure. The Islamic State, or ISIS, continues to wreak havoc throughout Iraq and Syria. It is laying a path of death and destruction in its wake, and it has inspired deadly attacks around the world and deadly attacks here at home. No offense is more appalling than the terrorists' complete disregard for human life. As this body has recognized, ISIS is waging a genocide against religious minorities in the Middle East. I recently had the opportunity to talk to some of those Yazidi girls and Christian minorities about what they had been through, as well as to talk to Sunni and Kurdish families. It has unleashed a campaign of sickening violence against Muslims who do not share its radical beliefs and against the other religious minorities across the Middle East and beyond. Besides the human toll of ISIS' deplorable acts, we also mourn the tremendous loss of cultural heritage as these extremists loot and destroy their way through ancient sites in the territories that they conquer.…”