Israeli Quotes & Sayings

I got a number of very thoughtful responses to the email I sent out last night, most of which I don't have time to respond to right now. Thanks everyone for the encouragement, questions, criticism. Daniel's response was particularly inspiring to me and deserves to be shared. The resistance of Israeli Jewish people to the occupation and the enormous risk taken by those refusing to serve in the Israeli military offers an example, especially for those of us living in the United States, of how to behave when you discover that atrocities are being commited in your name. Thank you. — Rachel Corrie

The poet must be alike polished by an intercourse with the world as with the studies of taste; one to whom labour is negligence, refinement a science, and art a nature. — Isaac D'Israeli

Literary friendship is a sympathy not of manners, but of feelings. — Isaac D'Israeli

The more vulgar apologists for U.S. and Israeli crimes solemnly explain that, while Arabs purposely kill civilians, the U.S. and Israel, being democratic societies, do not intend to do so. Their — Noam Chomsky

In Arab capitals, the failure of the United States to stop Iran's nuclear program is understood as American weakness in the struggle for dominance in the Middle East, making additional cooperation from Arab leaders on Israeli-Palestinian issues even less likely. — Elliott Abrams

The idea that the rest of the world was somehow being held hostage by the Arab-Israeli conflict once had a minimal basis in reality. In the first 20 years of Israel's existence, every Arab country was in an active state of war with the Jewish state. — John Podhoretz

I had taken office during a raging intifada, with Yasser Arafat running the Palestinian Authority, Israeli leaders committed to a Greater Israel policy, and Arab nations complaining from the sidelines. By the time I left, the Palestinians had a president and prime minister who rejected terrorism. The Israelis had withdrawn from some settlements and supported a two-state solution. And Arab nations were playing an active role in the peace process. — George W. Bush

Jordan has a very important part in any Arab-Israeli peace process. — King Hussein

My closest friends from Israel make fun of me for becoming an American, and my American friends make fun of how Israeli I am ... I can't win. — Alona Tal

Indeed, there are recurrent hints in the Bible that the Israelites had feelings of guilt about taking the Canaanites' land,147 a curious adumbration of Israeli twinges about homeless Palestinian Arabs in the late twentieth century. The Israelites, however, hid any remorse in the belief that the conquest was a pious act: it is 'because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is driving them out before you'. — Paul Johnson

It is obvious that putting the Arab-Israeli dispute on a resolution track would be an important element of overcoming the confidence problem in the region. — Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Herzl had said that attracting the Jewish diaspora would be a slow process, but after a half century as a nation, according to the Israeli Ministry of Tourism, only 17 percent of American Jews have ever visited Israel. — Mark Kurlansky

The protesters, in Jerusalem and in Tel Aviv, revealed an open and raw wound at the heart of Israeli society, the pain of a community crying out over a sense of discrimination, racism, and of being unanswered. — Reuven Rivlin

Together, these advocates create a pro-Israeli case so compelling that the idea and reality of Israel has worked itself deep into American culture, politics and foreign policy. Many American Jews refuse to accept it, but the real debate between Israel's supporters and detractors in America is all but over. — Aaron David Miller

Although Israel was founded based on the historic Jewish homeland and the need to have a Jewish homeland, Israeli democracy has been premised on everybody in the country being treated equally and fairly. And I think that that is what's best about Israeli democracy. — Barack Obama

I was critical of the Israeli government, however, for not being prepared for the move. One does not uproot thousands of people without planning in advance what will be done with them. This was a political and human error in which the government functioned poorly. — Norman Lamm

The Israeli philosopher Avishai Margalit has suggested that the important thing is not a person's identity but his or her identifications.

Tablet: A New Read on Jewish Life — David Kaufmann

I have no sentiments for nationality or for soil. But I grew up in Israel, so those things are in my blood, and I want to be part of Israeli culture. — Mili Avital

(Israeli-style eggs poached in tomato — Brian B.

We are in a strange world,' one senior Israeli official said to me, 'where the defense minister and to a lesser degree the prime minister are focused intently on the military option, and the intelligence services and the military, with some exceptions, are deeply doubtful. — David E. Sanger

I consider myself to be a true friend of the Israeli people. But I define friendship as someone who takes care of a friend, who just doesn't use or exploit a friend. And, you know, there's that old adage: 'Friends don't let friends drive drunk'. — Scott Ritter

If the [captured Israeli] soldiers are not returned, we will turn Lebanon's clock back 20 years. — Dan Halutz

Rain, rain, go away, Come again some other day! - American nursery rhyme Rain, rain, from the skies All day long, drops of water Drip drop drip drop Clap your hands! - Israeli nursery rhyme A — Seth M. Siegel

Downslopes in the curve show that at various times Algeria, Australia, Brazil, Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Romania, South Korea, Switzerland, Sweden, Taiwan, and Yugoslavia have pursued nuclear weapons but then thought the better of it - occasionally through the persuasion of an Israeli air strike, but more often by choice. — Steven Pinker

No Palestinian, young or old, would be frightened by these Israeli tactics. — Mohammed Dahlan

(Krav maga is an Israeli-developed fighting style centered on the idea that when I put you down, you stay down. It's fast, it's brutal, and I love it. Sort of like club dancing with more eye gouging and less grinding.) — Seanan McGuire

If any overarching conclusion emerges from the Afghan and Iraq Wars (and from their Israeli equivalents), it's this: victory is a chimera. — Andrew Bacevich

If Saddam's regime and survival are threatened [by invasion], he will have nothing to lose, and may use everything at his disposal ... If weapons of mass destruction land on Israeli soil, killing innocent civilians, the experts I have consulted believe Israel will retaliate, and possibly with nuclear weapons ... Nor can we rule out the possibility that Saddam would assault American forces with chemical or biological weapons. — Edward Kennedy

Criticizing Israel is not anti-Semitic, and saying so is vile. But singling out Israel for opprobrium and international sanction out of all proportion to any other party in the Middle East is anti-Semitic, and not saying so is dishonest. — Thomas L. Friedman

I was a witness to lots of death ... Saving a human life was something really, really beautiful ... no matter who they are. Not only Israeli people owe me their lives. I guarantee many terrorists, many Palestinian leaders, owe me their lives - or in other words, they owe my Lord their lives. — Mosab Hassan Yousef

I think it was smart that you're wary of using the word "terrorism," and if you talk about the cycle of violence, or "an eye for an eye," you could be perpetuating the idea that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a balanced conflict, instead of a largely unarmed people against the fourth most powerful military in the world. — Rachel Corrie

outbreak of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war was not a result of some global strategy, but of a set of specific, regional calculations and miscalculations; on one hand, Israel's long-standing wish to strike at the growing military power of Egypt and, on the other, the tactical mistakes of Nasser in May of that year, through which he requested the withdrawal of UN buffer forces and so left himself open to the Israeli attack. — Fred Halliday

If you really wanted to settle down the Middle East, if what you wanted was change in the Middle East, it is perfectly obvious that the first step is resolving the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. — Molly Ivins

That can be achieved by termination of Israeli occupation to the territories according to the international resolutions related, so the Palestinian State can be establish with Jerusalem as capital for such State. — Ali Abdullah Saleh

Israel is a wonderful place to be an artist - a place where imagination flourishes. Israeli culture is refreshingly avant garde - making films, music, performance art and visual art that continues to push the envelope, inspire and empower. — Ryan Kavanaugh

Much of what has gone wrong in the pursuit of Arab-Israeli peace is due to a lack of strong leadership, primarily among the Palestinians. — Edgar Bronfman, Sr.

After the golden age of Latinity, we gradually slide into the silver, and at length precipitately descend into the iron. — Isaac D'Israeli

The greatest tragedy of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is that everyone knows how it will end. We will divide up the region. — Yair Lapid

The Holocaust never quite leaves Israeli Jews alone. Arabs use it against them and they use it against Arabs. Jews use it against other Jews. Even the president of the United States, it seems, can use it against the prime minister of Israel. — David K. Shipler

It's very hard, for example, to justify the thirty-four-year occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. It's very hard to justify 140 Israeli settlements and roughly 400,000 settlers. — Edward Said

In September 1993, President Clinton presided over a handshake between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat on the White House lawn - the climax of a 'day of awe,' as the press described it. — Noam Chomsky

The defects of great men are the consolation of the dunces. — Isaac D'Israeli

The core issue here is that the Israeli government refuses to commit to terms of reference for the negotiations that are based on international law and United Nations resolutions, and that it frantically continues to intensify building of settlements on the territory of the State of Palestine. — Mahmoud Abbas

We must see what in the Israeli identity - in the Israeli - we can give to other people rather than speaking so often of taking, expanding territory. — A. B. Yehoshua

They had bombed and burned,killed and maimed,plundered and looted.Now they had come to claim the land. — Susan Abulhawa

But Arafat's devotion was to the Palestinian cause and not to the Palestinian people. [...] As a result, Arafat delayed the conflict's solution, leaving a legacy of avoidable disaster and unnecessary suffering. — Barry Rubin

If the method is able to liberate our land, to liberate our people from Israeli jails, to reconstruct what was destroyed by the long-standing Israeli occupation, at that time we can discuss. — Mahmoud Al-Zahar

The negroes are lovers of ludicrous actions, and hence all their ceremonies seem farcical. — Isaac D'Israeli

The Palestinians were deliberately forced into refugee camps by their fellow Muslims and not permitted to integrate in any way into the society of their unwilling hosts. Their own people didn't even try to help them; instead they prevailed upon the United Nations and gullible Western charities to supply the refugees' needs. They have been kept in these camps for more than sixty years - like an unhealed wound by their own people - just to be used as political pawns by Muslim negotiators to charge their plight as "Israeli aggression. — Hal Lindsey

A nickname a man may chance to wear out; but a system of calumnity, pursued by a faction, may descend even to posterity. This principal has taken full effect on this state favorite. — Isaac D'Israeli

Sharona Muir has written a gripping personal memoir about her odyssey to rediscover and reclaim her father. Along the way she uncovers some hard truths about the heroic founders of Israel and the Beginnings of Israeli science. The Book of Telling keeps in all the fears and resentments and consolations and warmth of such a process-at once her own story and the tale of a nation. — Edmund White

I want the Israeli government to be made accountable for its behaviour to the Palestinians, and I want the people of the U.S. to cease acting as if they don't understand what is going on. — Alice Walker

Israeli Arabs have more political rights than any other Arabs in the Middle East, including their compatriots in the Palestinian Authority. — Jack Schwartz

The issue [Israeli-Palestinian conflict], already lasting more than half a century, has brought deep suffering to the Palestinian people and remains an important reason of extended turbulence in the Middle East region. — Xi Jinping

I am so sorry to hear of Asher's passing. I will miss his scientific insight and advice, but even more his humor and stubborn integrity. I remember when one of his colleagues complained about Asher's always rejecting his manuscript when they were sent to him to referee. Asher said in effect, 'You should thank me. I am only trying to protect your reputation.' He often pretended to consult me, a fellow atheist, on matters of religious protocol.

{Charles H. Bennett's letter written to the family of Israeli physicist, Asher Peres} — Charles H. Bennett

Hamas is responsible for countless homicide bombings that have killed hundreds of Israeli citizens. They have waged a terror war with the sole intent of murdering innocent people. — Vito Fossella

I'm a United States senator. I'm not an Israeli senator. — Chuck Hagel

A work, however, should be judged by its design and its execution, and not by any preconceived notion of what it ought to be according to the critic, rather than the author. — Isaac D'Israeli

The first time someone tried to share the Gospel with me, I naively explained that I was Jewish and born in Israel, thank you ... This was a big mistake. In certain parts of Christian America, admitting I was an Israeli-born Jew turned me into walking catnip. — Hanna Rosin

The delights of reading impart the vivacity of youth even to old age. — Isaac D'Israeli

A great work always leaves us in a state of musing. — Isaac D'Israeli

The Obama administration has consistently refused to recognize Jerusalem as Israeli territory, let alone as the capital of Israel. — Ben Shapiro

On the other hand, we have in Israel, an Israeli government which has been elected by the Israeli people. Their political agenda is not for peace. They are from the camp anti-peace. — Rafik Hariri

The Israeli mentality was totally different to mine. They just didn't understand people like me. They couldn't understand why I had been in a ghetto. We were totally different. — Edgar Hilsenrath

Nothing could have prepared me for the reality of the situation here. You just can't imagine it unless you see it. And even then your experience is not at all the reality: what with the difficulties the Israeli army would face if they shot an unarmed US citizen, the fact that I have money to buy water when the army destroys wells, and of course, the fact that I have the option to leave. I am allowed to see the ocean. — Rachel Corrie

The 1948 war's diplomatic maneuvers and military campaigns are well engraved in Israeli Jewish historiography. What is missing is the chapter on the ethnic cleansing carried out by the Jews in 1948. As a result of that campaign, five hundred Palestinian villages and eleven urban neighborhoods were destroyed, seven hundred thousand Palestinians were expelled, and several thousand were massacred.2 Even today, it is hard to find a succinct summary of the planning, execution, and repercussions of these tragic results. — Noam Chomsky

Saying that the origin of the Islamic State (IS) is within the Muslim Brotherhood organisation only strengthens IS. This is what the Israeli government asserts when claiming that Hamas and IS are the exact same thing. By saying so, the historical resistance [against the Israeli occupation] is viewed as unlawful, called extremism and terrorism. — Tariq Ramadan

I also believe that US backing for Israeli policies of expansion of the Israeli state and oppression of the Palestinian people is the major cause of bitter division and violence in the world. — Clare Short

So long as there is an Israeli occupation in Palestine and so long as U.S. policy is biased, the so-called terrorism that the United States fears will escalate because the mistakes of U.S. foreign policy are pouring oil on fire. — Khaled Mashal

Military metaphors are rarely exact, but sending Republicans against Democrats when the issue hangs in the balance is nearly always as futile as sending George B. McClellan against Robert E. Lee, the Italians against Marshal Montgomery's desert rats or an Arab armored division against an Israeli rifle company. The copy desk can write the headline before the battle begins and take the rest of the night off. — Wesley Pruden

Yes. I'm an Israeli citizen living in a dream world; a Jewish princess in Arabia, I should have listened to my own children. For God's sake. Egypt is not my country! — Linda Ruth Horowitz

If the corrupt Jordanian monarchy were overthrown, it would be the ideal opportunity to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, because the West Bank and Jordan could then be united. There is already a Palestinian majority in Jordan, and there is enough room for everyone there. That would be the best revolution I could imagine. — Tom Segev

The Women in Black are Israeli Jews who meet wall in Jerusalem. They meet every Friday, the Sabbath evening, and pray. They begin by singing Kaddish for all the Israelis killed in the fighting in Israel that week. When they are finished, they pause and read all the names. Then, they turn again to face the wall and sing Kaddish again, this time for all of Palestinians killed in the fighting that week, and they turn when they are finished and once again recite the litany of the names of those killed. — Megan McKenna

All is extremely genteel; and there is almost as much repose as in the golden saloons of the contiguous palaces. At any rate, if there be as much vice, there is as little crime. — Isaac D'Israeli

Today again the teacher is the important thing, but on the other hand anti-Semitism is growing today. No doubt about it. All over the world, especially in Europe, and it's true they begin with anti-Israeli attitudes and then it's so strong that it runs over and becomes anti-Semitic. — Elie Wiesel

Today the Israeli government continues seizures of Palestinian land for settlements, military incursions into surrounding countries and denial of the right of Palestinians expelled by terror to return. Ariel Sharon, Israel's prime minister, is a war criminal who should be in prison, not in office. Israel's own Kahan commission found that Sharon shared responsibility for the Sabra and Shatila massacres. — Ken Livingstone

Israel is a colonialist-imp erialist phenomenon. There is no such thing as an Israeli people. Before 1948, world geography knew of no state such as Israel. Israel is the result of an invasion, of aggression. — Muammar Al-Gaddafi

Toughness found fertile soil in the hearts of Palestinians, and the grains of resistance embedded themselves in their skin. Endurance evolved as a hallmark of refugee society. But the price they paid was the subduing of tender vulnerability. They learned to celebrate martyrdom. Only martyrdom offered freedom. Only in death were they at last invulnerable to Israel. Martyrdom became the ultimate defiance of Israeli occupation. — Susan Abulhawa

I love meeting Israeli people. They look at me like a son — Jerry Seinfeld

I was a child during the Lebanese civil war, and I remember Israeli bombardments. So growing up, my view of Israel was completely negative. I'm not coming from a neutral place, but with time, I've had to re-examine my thinking. — Ziad Doueiri

It was actually an Israeli cartoonist, Nurit Karlin, who made me think that I could draw for 'The New Yorker.' I saw her work published in the magazine in the early 1970s - she was the only woman working as a cartoonist at 'The New Yorker' at the time. — Liza Donnelly

When I look at the record of President Obama concerning the major issue security I think it's a highly satisfactory record from Israeli point of view. — Shimon Peres

A circle may be small, yet it may be as mathematically beautiful and perfect as a large one. — Isaac D'Israeli

As an Israeli, I have come to understand: there is no way to love Israel and reject a two-state peace, no way to love Israel and reject Palestine. — Yael Dayan

Proverbs were bright shafts in the Greek and Latin quivers ... — Isaac D'Israeli

I hope that the Palestinians don't make the mistake of unleashing a new intifada. They've tried it twice before, and the consequences were bad for both sides. But I don't think the forces are there (that could carry out) an uprising against the leadership. The people that could initiate it are in Israeli prisons. And what could they hope to achieve? In the end, they're too weak to end the Israeli occupation. — Tom Segev

The custom to put others in the line of fire is a recurring theme in Judaism. It boils down to the Levite Korahites' willingness to sacrifice their ordinary Jewish subjects in order to ensure their own survival. This should be a historic warning to modern-day Israelites: their orthodox government would not hesitate to risk the lives of the many for the sake of the survival of the few in the orthodox elite. The citizens of Israel will have to think about how to remove the systemic threat that comes from within their own ranks. — A.J. Deus

Just as we send young American Jews to Israel through the Birthright program, we need to also consider a 'reverse Birthright' for Israeli kids to come see America. — Edgar Bronfman, Sr.

The arrival of thousands of Muslim infiltrators to Israeli territory is a clear threat to the state's Jewish identity. The refugees' place is not among us, and the initiative to transfer them to Australia is the right and just solution. — Danny Danon

In the controversy that followed the prince's remarks, his most staunch defender was professor John Taylor, a scholar whose work I had last noticed when he gave good reviews to the psychokinetic (or whatever) capacities of the Israeli conjuror and fraud Uri Geller. The heir to the throne seems to possess the ability to surround himself - perhaps by some mysterious ultramagnetic force? - with every moon-faced spoon-bender, shrub-flatterer, and water-diviner within range. — Christopher Hitchens

The new crimes that the US and Israel were committing in Gaza as 2009 opened do not fit easily into any standard category - except for the category of familiarity. — Noam Chomsky

AL QAEDA SPENT ABOUT $500,000 TO PRODUCE 9/11, WHEREAS THE direct losses of that day's destruction plus the costs of the American response to the attacks were $3.3 trillion. In other words, for every dollar Al Qaeda spent planning and executing the attacks, the United States spent $7 million.1 The costs of 9/11 equal one-fifth of the US national debt. In 2006, Hezbollah fired a precision-guided cruise missile at an Israeli ship — Moises Naim

The most noble criticism is that in which the critic is not the antagonist so much as the rival of the author. — Isaac D'Israeli

Vice-President Ford, possibly preparing for higher duties, assessed Kissinger's part in the Syrian-Israeli troop disengagement as the great diplomatic triumph of this century or perhaps any other. — Edwin Newman

The claim that Israel seeks to annihilate the Palestinians is simply a lie. Israel seeks to stop rocket attacks and tunnel invasions, and as long as Hamas is dedicated to those actions, they can expect a forceful Israeli reaction. — James Howard Kunstler

Israel has to accommodate the Palestinian demands and aspirations for ending occupation and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. That is the only answer. The Israeli aggression on Gaza does not bring peace to Israel. We know that. We want end of occupation. — Benjamin Netanyahu

In order to restore security for Israeli citizens, every home, mother and child in Israel, and to establish a stable and strong government that will unite the nation ... I hereby declare my candidacy for the Likud party leadership and premiership of Israel. — Benjamin Netanyahu

There is an art of reading, as well as an art of thinking, and an art of writing. — Isaac D'Israeli

Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it. — Hassan Al-Banna

Close to 80 percent of all terrorist activity in Samaria was directed and financed either by Hizbullah or the Iranians. Iran continues to increase its involvement in terror attacks inside Israel, particularly through a small but radical minority of Israeli Arabs which Iran supports and directs. — Ariel Sharon