Political Quotes

“I very much appreciate the time that has been set aside here, and I appreciate the gentleman yielding. I have got to say at the outset, one of the great tragedies of the half a million deaths in Syria is that I think it was quite avoidable. If we think back to 7 years ago and how it started, it began with people marching in the streets of Damascus saying, ``peaceful, peaceful.'' Their goal was to try to get some element of human rights in a country in which people were being abducted and disappeared in these chambers where they were tortured and killed. We know a lot more now than we did at the time because of a brave military photographer by the name of Caesar, and Caesar brought those pictures out to the West, 55,000 of them. The way in which the regime conducted itself drove the population in Syria to react. And now, after 7 years of war, brutal war, the atrocities continue in Syria; and in many ways, after listening this morning to Caesar and seeing his photographs again, they are worse than they were. I say that because, as we speak, despite a ceasefire agreed to by Russia, the Assad regime, backed by Russian war planes and backed by the Iranian militia from neighboring Iran on the ground, is engaged in a brutal assault on southern Syria. They are engaged there, and more than 45,000 civilians have fled as Russian and regime forces have intensified their shelling and their air raids again on civilian populations.…”