Robert Fisk

“When I visited Syrian special forces along the front lines, I was given extraordinary amounts of detail. They gave me the code numbers for the various positions they've got, told me where the rebels were - about 800 meters away in a forest. I met soldiers who had been wounded but were still serving.”

“I don't know what happens if they get bin Laden. I'm much more interested in what happens if they don't get bin Laden.”

“The dead cannot speak. But hitherto unknown information has emerged from the confidential archives of the Syrian presidency and foreign ministry, published in a new book by Bouthaina Shaaban, who spent ten years as Hafez's interpreter and is still an adviser to his son Bashar.”

“And it's true, you hear things in Damascus and, after a few hours, the human double-take stops operating.”

“When you have a crime against humanity that is so awesome in scale and death, it is more than permissible to look around and say, who recently has been declaring war on the United States? Of course, the compass points straight to bin Laden.”

“American power in the Middle East is collapsing. It doesn't need much more than a shove, and it will - and that's not going to be a good thing.”

“The Americans may think they have 'liberated' Baghdad but the tens of thousands of thieves - they came in families and cruised the city in trucks and cars searching for booty - seem to have a different idea what liberation means.”

“The Syrian army is tired of corruption. It is tired of party nepotism. It is becoming very angry with those it blames for the war.”

“In one way, I fear all Damascus is a dungeon. Or do you have to live here to appreciate that?”

“It's a journalist's job to be a witness to history. We're not there to worry about ourselves. We're there to try and get as near as we can, in an imperfect world, to the truth and get the truth out.”