Victor Davis Hanson Quotes

Only the change on the international scene, the crisis in the gulf, and the strong, firm position of the United States against aggression between two Arab countries created realities that led to the Madrid Peace Conference.

It is obvious that putting the Arab-Israeli dispute on a resolution track would be an important element of overcoming the confidence problem in the region.

My conviction is that the best strategy to defend the West is to defend Israel.

Jordan has a very important part in any Arab-Israeli peace process.

Those in the international community that refuse to put red lines before Iran don't have a moral right to place a red light before Israel.

We have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts.

For Israel there is tension between our values and the brutal reality [of the Middle East]

Nobody ever lost any money betting against Arab-Israeli peace

The future of Israel has been a key bipartisan concern for generations of Americans, and it is almost axiomatic that if the Palestinians have no viable future, neither does Israel.

Toward the Palestinians, Israel can only give. But when dealing with the entire Arab world, Israel can get a lot.

I've been involved in ties with elements in the Arab world for years now. They wish to establish relations with Israel, but they cannot do so while there is no peace process.

IS [Islamic State] has played a major role in helping Bashar al-Assad to reposition Syria on the international scene. Now, it is almost impossible to come up with a solution that would exclude him. The political game appears to be very cynical indeed.

To defeat ISIS and let Iran get nuclear weapons would be to win the battle and lose the war.

With respect to Syria, we are going to continue to work as we have over the last five, six years to push towards a political transition and settlement.

The big issue is whether the United States will succeed in its venture of reshaping the Middle East. It is not clear to me that using military force is the way to do it. We should not have gone into Iraq. But we have.

I had said from the start that I thought Iraq was a mistake, that we should have stayed focused on Afghanistan. I think it was the right decision because the Taliban at that point had gotten a lot of momentum before I'd gotten into office, partly because we hadn't been paying attention as much as we needed to to Afghanistan.

As commander in chief, I will not speak to Vladimir Putin until we've set up that no-fly zone; until we've gathered our Sunni-Arab allies and begun to deny ISIS territory; until I've called the supreme leader of Iran and told him new deal - new deal. We the United States of America are going to cut off the money flow, which we can do; which we don't need anyone's permission or collaboration to do.

I think America has to do more than be a broker now. Because both the Palestinians are weak and Israel is very weak.

I think, broadly speaking, the US military's role - US military activism in various parts of the Islamic world over the past several decades has been counterproductive.

Early withdrawal from Iraq would result in unarguably, defeat and humiliation for the United States. There's no question. We would be defeated by definition. We would be humiliated in that defeat.

Russia can play an important role in removing the occupation, ending the aggression and achieving national (Palestinian) rights.

What China would do, I cannot predict. China has all but given up the claim to the use of force, except in the circumstance of Taiwan declaring its independence. That is a huge step forward over what the situation was many years ago.

Make no mistake about it: Operation Desert Storm truly was a victory of good over evil, of freedom over tyranny, of peace over war.

If one little old general in shirt sleeves can take Saigon, think about 200 million Chinese comin' down those trails. No sir, I don't want to fight them.

The war with Iraq ... had to be one of the greatest non sequiturs in military history. Attacked by a gang composed largely of Islamic militants from Saudi Arabia, the United States countered by invading an unrelated country, and one of the most secular in the Middle East at that.