Elliott Abrams

“The best-armed and best-trained divisions of the Syrian army are Alawite.”

“It's time to bury the unreal, failed 'realism' of those who have long thought that dictators brought stability.”

“Israel and the Palestinians had been at the table together for decades until the Obama/Mitchell/Rahm Emanuel decision to demand a total end to Israeli construction froze not the settlements but the diplomacy.”

“For the entire first term, Obama and his people blamed Bush for everything - which is another way of saying they felt Bush and the Bush years were the inescapable reference point for everything they were themselves doing.”

“Libya as a country is a relatively new concept. The period of Libya as a modern nation really starts after World War II.”

“In the spring of 2007, Israeli intelligence brought to Washington proof that the Assad regime in Syria was building a nuclear reactor along the Euphrates - with North Korean help. This reactor was a copy of the Yongbyon reactor the North Koreans had built, and was part of a Syrian nuclear weapons program.”

“U.S.-Israel relations are often depicted as an extended honeymoon, but that's a false image.”

“The devastation of the ancient Christian community in Iraq is well known.”

“I would have thought that if you're going to try to punish the Syrians and prevent them from using chemical weapons again, the thing to do is a one-time strike. Maybe a cruise missile strike at one or two of their air bases just so they know what they're going to gain from using chemical weapons on the battlefield.”

“Times change. Cable news and the Internet alone have transformed the way outreach to the American people can be accomplished.”

“People are entitled to believe the government is constantly lying to them, but it isn't.”

“Like all forms of collective security, multilateral sanctions require a unanimity rarely achieved in international politics.”

“Iran exports about 2.2 million barrels a day.”

“I grew up in Queens, in New York City, in a middle class Jewish family. My mother was a public school teacher, my father was a lawyer. They were Democrats - kind of middle-of-the-road democrats.”

“Gadhafi's vicious regime has left Libya far worse than he found it on the day of his coup in 1969.”

“It's not good for Israel to govern millions of Palestinians.”

“There isn't any way for the people of Nicaragua to find out what's going on in Nicaragua.”

“The mishandling of the would-be airplane bomber Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab's visa is only the latest piece of evidence that the granting of visas should be taken away from the State Department. For the granting of visas - especially today, when terrorism is such a complex threat - is far closer to being a law-enforcement function.”

“Legislation for the Caribbean basin has led to more jobs in the Dominican Republic.”

“If Iran gets a nuclear weapon, its influence and that of Hamas and Hezbollah are strengthened.”