Syrian Arab News Agency
October 31, 2019

"As for Trump . . . he is the best American President, not because his policies are good, but because he is the most transparent president.  All American presidents perpetrate all kinds of political atrocities and all crimes and yet still win the Nobel Prize and project themselves as defenders of human rights and noble and unique American values, or Western values in general. The reality is that they are a group of criminals who represent the interests of American lobbies, i.e. the large oil and arms companies, and others.  Trump talks transparently, saying that what we want is oil. This is the reality of American policy, at least since WWII" — Bashar al-Assad

Interview Transcript

Journalist: Hello and welcome to this special interview with the President of the Syrian Arab Republic, His Excellency Dr Bashar al-Assad.  Thank you for receiving us Mr President.  Your last interview with Syrian media was several years ago and therefore we have a lot of questions.  We will begin with political questions and then move into internal issues.

President Assad: You are welcome, and as always let us speak with full openness.

Journalist: Mr President, thank you very much for receiving us.  Since the political issues are pressing at the moment we will start with politics, Mr President. The United States announced a few days ago that the leader of the terrorist organization ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, was killed. And it thanked Russia, Syria, Iraq, the Turks and the Kurds for helping kill Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Trump thanked Syria, but we have not heard any comment from Damascus. What is your take on Trump thanking Syria? Did Syria really take part in this operation?

President Assad:  Absolutely not, we heard about this only through the media. Maybe, the reason behind including a number of countries as participants in this operation is to give it credibility so these countries will feel not embarrassed, but have the desire to be that they are part of a "great" operation, as the Americans have tried to portray it. And in this way, they are credited with fighting terrorism.  We do not need such credit.  We are the ones fighting terrorism.  We have no relations and have had no contact with any American institutions.

More importantly, we do not really know whether the operation did actually take place or not.  No aircraft were detected on radar screens.  Why were the remains of Baghdadi not shown?  This is the same scenario that was followed with Bin Laden.  If there are going to use different pretexts in order not to show the remains, let us recall how President Saddam Husain was captured and how the whole operation was shown from A to Z; they showed pictures and video clips after they captured him.  The same happened when they killed his sons several months later; they showed the bodies.  So, why did they hide everything about the Bin Laden operation and now also the Baghdadi operation?  This is part of the tricks played by the Americans.  That is why we should not believe everything they say unless they come up with evidence.  American politicians are actually guilty until proven innocent, not the other way around.

Journalist: Mr President, if Baghdadi has actually been killed, does it mean the end of his organization, or is it as usual that there will be new leaders and new organizations which are being prepared for the moment when the cards of their predecessors have been burned out?

President Assad:  First, Baghdadi represents ISIS, and ISIS represents a type of doctrine, which is the extremist Wahhabi doctrine.  This type of thought is more than two centuries old.  As long as this thought is alive and has not receded, this means that the death of Baghdadi, or even the death of ISIS as a whole, will have no effect on this extremist thought.

Regarding Baghdadi as an individual, it is well-known that he was in American prisons in Iraq, and that they let him out in order to play this role.  So, he is someone who could be replaced at any moment.  Was he really killed? Was he killed but through a different method, in a very ordinary way?  Was he kidnapped?  Was he hidden?  Or was he removed and given a facelift?  God only knows.  American politics are no different from Hollywood; it relies on the imagination.  Not even science fiction, just mere imagination.  So, you can take American politics and see it in Hollywood or else you can bring Hollywood and see it through American politics.  I believe the whole thing regarding this operation is a trick.  Baghdadi will be recreated under a different name, a different individual, or ISIS in its entirety might be reproduced as needed under a different name but with the same thought and the same purpose.  The director of the whole scenario is the same, the Americans.