Syria is in a state of war since its land was occupied for more than four decades, and the nature of the frontier in Syria implies that most of the army is in inhabited areas, most of the centers are in inhabited areas.

We wouldn't have withstood for two years and a half. We would have disintegration of the army, disintegration of the whole institution in the state ; we would have disintegration of Syria if that was the case. It can't be tolerated in Syria. I'm talking about the normal reaction of the people. If it's not a national army, it cannot have the support, and if it doesn't have the public support of every sect, it cannot do its job and advance recently. It cannot. The army of the family doesn't make national war.

[Peace in Syria] is [António Guterres] priority, and of course it's our priority, that's self-evident.

These people that started here, they support the government now against those rebels. Why talking about what happened at the very beginning is completely different from what is happening now - it's not the same. There's very high dynamic, things are changing on daily basis. It's a completely different image. Those people who wanted revolution, they are cooperating with us.

We are dealing with treachery and threats, which accompanied the establishment of Israel.

We are the fault line; if you don't deal with this fault line, you're going to have an earthquake, that's what we always said.

It's not religious war, but Al-Qaeda always use religions, Islam - actually, as a pretext and as a cover and as a mantle for their war and for their terrorism and for their killing and beheading and so on.