Terror Attack in Istanbul

Floor Speech

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Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, yesterday our NATO ally Turkey suffered a devastating terror attack at Istanbul's main airport that quickly brought to mind ISIL's attack in Brussels earlier this year.

We do not know yet if this attack was launched by ISIL or the PKK, but we do know that our intelligence community will do all it can to help the Turks combat terrorism and defeat this threat. As CIA Director John Brennan reminded us all earlier this month, ``[D]espite all of our progress against ISIL on the battlefield and in the financial realm, our efforts have not reduced the group's terrorism capability and its global reach.''

In recent days Turkey has taken diplomatic steps to improve bilateral relations with Russia and Israel, and now the United States must extend its hand to our NATO partners and assure them that we will stand with them in the face of this attack and work together to defeat ISIL.

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