Weekly Address: President Obama – Defeating ISIL

March 26, 2016 JanF Editors' Choice, From the White House 6

The President’s Weekly Address post is also an Open News Thread. Feel free to share other news stories in the comments.

From the White House – Weekly Address

In this week’s address, President Obama offered his thoughts and prayers to the people of Belgium and to families of the victims of the terrorist attacks in Brussels, including at least two Americans. He reiterated our support of Belgium as a close friend and ally of the United States, especially in the fight against terrorism. The President emphasized that defeating ISIL remains our top military, intelligence, and national security priority. He reminded us that as we move forward in this fight, we must use the power of our example as a Nation that is open to refugees escaping ISIL’s violence, refuses ISIL’s hateful and violent propaganda, and rejects any attempt to stigmatize Muslim-Americans. Together, we will not abandon our values and way of life – we will succeed and the terrorists will fail.

Transcript: Weekly Address: Defeating ISIL

Remarks of President Barack Obama as Delivered
Weekly Address, The White House, March 26, 2016

This week, our hearts are with the people of Belgium, as terrorist attacks claimed the lives of more than thirty people.

Yesterday, we learned that at least two Americans were killed. We pray for their families and loved ones. At least fourteen Americans were injured. And we pray for their full recovery – along with everyone else affected by these attacks.

Earlier this week, I called the Prime Minister of Belgium and offered him our full array of support in bringing to justice any terrorists involved in planning or aiding this unconscionable attack on innocent men, women, and children. Belgium is a close friend and ally of the United States. And when it comes to our friends, America has their back. Especially as we fight the scourge of terrorism.

More broadly, we’re going to continue to root out and defeat ISIL. We’ve been taking out ISIL leadership, and this week, we removed one of their top leaders from the battlefield – permanently. A relentless air campaign – and support for forces in Iraq and Syria who are fighting ISIL on the ground – has allowed us to take approximately forty percent of the populated territory that ISIL once held in Iraq. We’re supporting Iraqi Security Forces who are beginning to put pressure on the ISIL stronghold of Mosul. And we will not stop until ISIL’s safe-havens are destroyed.

We’re also working to disrupt plots against the United States and against our friends and allies. A team of FBI agents is on the ground in Belgium supporting the investigation. We’ve ramped up our intelligence cooperation so that we can root out ISIL’s operations. And we constantly review our homeland security posture to remain vigilant against any efforts to target the United States.

ISIL poses a threat to the entire civilized world. That’s why we’ve been leading a truly global coalition that will be vital to our success. Secretary Kerry is leading an international effort to bring the Syrian civil war to an end, a critical piece of restoring stability to that war-torn part of the world. And next week, dozens of world leaders will come here to Washington for a summit focused on nuclear security. We’ll use that opportunity to also review our joint efforts against ISIL, and to make sure the world remains united in this effort to protect our people.

As we move forward in this fight, we have to wield another weapon alongside our airstrikes, our military, our counterterrorism work, and our diplomacy. And that’s the power of our example. Our openness to refugees fleeing ISIL’s violence. Our determination to win the battle against ISIL’s hateful and violent propaganda – a distorted view of Islam that aims to radicalize young Muslims to their cause. In that effort, our most important partners are American Muslims. That’s why we have to reject any attempt to stigmatize Muslim-Americans, and their enormous contributions to our country and our way of life. Such attempts are contrary to our character, to our values, and to our history as a nation built around the idea of religious freedom. It’s also counterproductive. It plays right into the hands of terrorists who want to turn us against one another; who need a reason to recruit more people to their hateful cause.

I am a father. And just like any other parent, the awful images from Brussels draw my thoughts to my own children’s safety. That’s also why you should be confident that defeating ISIL remains our top military, intelligence, and national security priority.

We will succeed. The terrorists will fail. They want us to abandon our values and our way of life. We will not. They want us to give in to their vision of the future. We will defeat them with ours. Because we know that the future belongs not to those who seek only to destroy – but to those who have the courage to build.

Thanks.

Bolding added.

~

6 Comments

  1. President Obama:

    They want us to abandon our values and our way of life. We will not. They want us to give in to their vision of the future. We will defeat them with ours. Because we know that the future belongs not to those who seek only to destroy – but to those who have the courage to build.

  2. Steven Benen: Obama on ISIS: ‘They’re not an existential threat to us’

    … a reporter asked about the “optics” of Obama continuing with his schedule in the wake of the terrorist attack in Brussels. The American leader’s response raised some eyebrows.

    “Groups like ISIL can’t destroy us, they can’t defeat us. They don’t produce anything. They’re not an existential threat to us. They are vicious killers and murderers who perverted one of the world’s great religions.

    The president went on to explain that he believes in reminding terrorists about the weakness by rejecting their efforts to change how we live.

    But for some on the right, there was an important problem. What does Obama mean ISIS isn’t “an existential threat”? How could he possibly say that?

    I get the sense that there’s some confusion about the meaning of the word “existential,” so let’s take a moment to clarify. It refers to our existence – an existential threat is a threat that puts our existence in jeopardy. If, for example, a killer points a loaded gun at someone, the person at the other end of the barrel is facing an existential threat because the gunman might kill them. […]

    As we’ve seen too often, ISIS militants kill innocents indiscriminately, and efforts to destroy the network must obviously continue. But to believe ISIS is an existential threat is to believe that the terrorists may succeed in eliminating the United States altogether. Our whole country will simply be wiped from the map.

    And that’s bonkers. You can agree or disagree with the president’s decision to stick to his schedule, and attend diplomatic and social events abroad, but Obama’s assessment of the kind of threat ISIS poses to the United States was clearly correct.

    • The only “existential threat” to us comes from the NRA and its adherents, with their gun-totin’, open-carryin’, freedumb-lovin’ ways.

  3. In the News: Vice President Biden on the Supreme Court

    “What difference does it make if the Court has eight members or nine members?”

    The audience at the Georgetown University Law Center laughed when the Vice President Biden posed this question during his remarks there yesterday. But it’s a question that many Republicans in the Senate are genuinely asking right now, and every American needs to know the answer to it.

  4. Thanks for reproducing the President Obama’s remarks, Jan. He’s right, of course. I for one fear my fellow Americans much more than I fear Daesh.

    It was heartbreaking about the people killed in Brussels, although, as my Facebook friend keeps reminding us, people were killed the weekend before in Turkey. There was no outcry then, or at least not one that we heard here in the xenophobic USA.

    • That is sad. Some lives, apparently white Europeans in this case, are more noteworthy when they are ended.

Comments are closed.