Sen. Rand Paul tells Newsmax that the Obama administration is making a big mistake by failing to provide a “significant military presence” in dangerous countries like Libya.
The Kentucky Republican also castigates the administration for “sending weapons to the Muslim Brotherhood” in Egypt, and calls on Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi to clearly state his support for the Camp David Accords between his nation and Israel.
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Paul was elected in 2010 and is a founding member of the Tea Party Caucus. He is a member of the Foreign Relations Committee and the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Two people were killed Friday morning in a suicide bombing at the entrance to the American embassy in Ankara, Turkey. In an exclusive interview with Newsmax TV, Sen. Paul offers his reaction to the latest terrorist attack.
“At least this time they’re not trying to blame it on a movie,” he says, alluding to the administration’s response to the attack on American diplomatic personnel in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11.
“Terrorism is still a big problem around the world and radical Islam is a big problem. In fact that’s something I’ll be addressing next week in a foreign policy speech where I’ll talk about strategies for trying to contain radical Islam.”
Asked if the United States is losing the war against terrorism, given recent events in Libya, Algeria, Mali, and elsewhere, Paul responds: “It’s an ongoing struggle against really I would say radical Islam as opposed to terror.
“Tactics of terror have been around for thousands of years and will probably remain for the rest of time, but radical Islam is something that’s come about really in the last decade or two and will be with us for a long time. We need to understand who’s committing these atrocities, why they’re doing it, and we need to be able to defend ourselves.
“One of the mistakes they’re making is treating countries that are very dangerous like Libya, treating the embassy there the same as the Paris embassy or the London embassy and not having significant military presence to protect our embassy. That’s a mistake.
“Selling weapons to Egypt, F-16s and tanks, when Egypt is now run by the Muslim Brotherhood, doesn’t recognize what’s happened since the Arab Spring, doesn’t recognize the danger of sending sophisticated weaponry to people like President Morsi who recently said Jews are a bunch of bloodsuckers and descendants of apes and pigs.
“President Morsi also was at a prayer meeting not too long ago where a radical sheik called for the destruction of Israel and her supporters. This kind of rhetoric coming from the president of a country that we send sophisticated weapons to really shows that it’s unwise to continue sending weapons, and I disagree with the Obama administration about sending weapons to the Muslim Brotherhood.”
Paul says it is “really uncertain” if Morsi is on America’s side in the fight against radical Islam.
“One of the things I’ll be proposing in the near future will be an amendment in legislation that says no more money will go to President Morsi or to Egypt until they publicly have stated their support for the Camp David Accords and for a peaceful coexistence with Israel.
“They need to be publicly on record because President Morsi is not the government we signed with. He has shown himself to have racist tendencies and there are members of his administration that are Holocaust deniers.
“So the president needs to be on record publicly as supporting the Camp David Accords, and at the very least any money or arms sent to them should be contingent on that.
“I, frankly, wouldn’t send them arms either way.”
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