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" Look, Israel doesn't intend to introduce nuclear weapons, but if people are afraid that we have them, why not? It's a deterrent. "
Shimon Peres
Why Not
Afraid
Why
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" One of the things the United States does well is building coalitions. What the U.S. knows is that if you don't have a coalition with you, you will have a coalition against you. I don't want to see China and Russia on the side of Iran more strongly than they are. "
Shimon Peres
Building
More
You
" I believe that peace with the Palestinians is most urgent - urgent than ever before. It is necessary. It is crucial. It is possible. A delay may worsen its chances. Israel and the Palestinians are, in my judgment, ripe today to restart the peace process. "
Shimon Peres
Process
Believe
Judgment
" When you have two alternatives, the first thing you have to do is to look for the third that you didn't think about, that doesn't exist. "
Shimon Peres
You
Look
Two
" And in England there has always been something deeply pro-Arab, of course, not among all Englishmen, and anti-Israeli, in the establishment. They abstained in the 1947 UN partition resolution... They maintained an arms embargo against us in the 1950s... They always worked against us. They think the Arabs are the underdogs. "
Shimon Peres
Think
Against
Us
" Poverty and ignorance, which beget terror, are not eradicated by firing artillery shells. Borders do not stop rockets, and barbed wire does not prevent terror. "
Shimon Peres
Ignorance
Wire
Shells
" The signing of the Israel-PLO accord is more than a political milestone. It is a transformative event which touches every Jewish family - physically, emotionally, spiritually. "
Shimon Peres
Political
More
Jewish
" Israel welcomes the wind of change, and sees a window of opportunity. Democratic and science-based economies by nature desire peace. Israel does not want to be an island of affluence in an ocean of poverty. Improvements in our neighbours' lives mean improvements to the neighbourhood in which we live. "
Shimon Peres
Live
Nature
Peace
" We proved that the aggressors do not necessarily emerge as the victors, but we learned that the victors do not necessarily win peace. "
Shimon Peres
Emerge
Victors
Win
" There was one occasion when I was very young - eight years or seven years old - that Jewish businessmen went through the forest, and they were assassinated. And that was for the first time I saw in our paper where there were assassinations in our place. "
Shimon Peres
First Time
Forest
Place
" My family's dream, and my own, was to live in Israel, and our eventual voyage to the port of Jaffa was like making a dream come true. Had it not been for this dream and this voyage, I would probably have perished in the flames, as did so many of my people, among them most of my own family. "
Shimon Peres
Dream
True
People
" For 60 years, I was the most controversial figure in the country, and suddenly, I'm the most popular man in the land. Truth be told, I don't know when I was happier: then or now. "
Shimon Peres
Country
Now
Truth
" What should be the future of Israel? Is the land the most important choice, and for that reason to keep the whole of the land at any cost, or to have a partition and build the Jewish state on part of the land? And the other part? "
Shimon Peres
Future
Important
Land
" It is not rifles but people who triumph, and the conclusion from all the wars is that we need better people, not better rifles - to win wars, and mainly to avoid them. "
Shimon Peres
Need
People
Triumph
" My greatest mistake is that my dreams were too small. "
Shimon Peres
Dreams
Greatest
Mistake
" The uprising in Egypt was initiated by the young generation. The uprising achieved two things. One is it made the lives of dictators impossible. Today, if you are looking for a safe job, don't become a dictator. "
Shimon Peres
Job
Today
You
" I joined the army as a private. I was offered a rank at that time, but I refused. I preferred to remain a private. First of all, I wasn't taken by ranks, and before I knew it, they put me in the most sensitive positions anyway. "
Shimon Peres
First
Sensitive
Me
" In Israel, a land lacking in natural resources, we learned to appreciate our greatest national advantage: our minds. Through creativity and innovation, we transformed barren deserts into flourishing fields and pioneered new frontiers in science and technology. "
Shimon Peres
Science
Technology
Innovation
" What you can do with relations is greater than what you can do with guns. "
Shimon Peres
Than
Greater
Guns
" I never was after money. It never attracted me. "
Shimon Peres
Never
After
Attracted
" Peace with the Palestinians will open ports of peace all around the Mediterranean. The duty of leaders is to pursue freedom ceaselessly, even in the face of hostility, in the face of doubt and disappointment. Just imagine what could be. "
Shimon Peres
Freedom
Peace
Face
" As president, I was more successful; I had more opportunity than as prime minister. Why? I didn't have the power to give orders, to command, but I had the opportunity to call people to volunteer. In my period of presidency, I never heard the word 'no.' "
Shimon Peres
Power
Successful
People
" That was my first lesson from Ben-Gurion. Then I saw him making peace, and I saw him making war. He mobilized me before the war. The man was a very rare combination between a real intellectual and a born leader. There is a contradiction between the two. "
Shimon Peres
Me
Peace
War
" A politician and a government should be judged by one way only: on the record of what you do or did, not on what you say. "
Shimon Peres
You
Way
Say
" Israel was born under the British mandate. We learned from the British what democracy means, and how it behaves in a time of danger, war and terror. We thank Britain for introducing freedom and respect of human rights both in normal and demanding circumstances. "
Shimon Peres
Respect
War
Time
" Early in the morning, I fell in love with the girl that later on became my wife. At that time, we were so naive. I wanted to charm her, so I read her Capital by Marx. I thought somehow she would be convinced by the strength of his criticism about capital. "
Shimon Peres
Morning
Girl
Love
" Television has made dictatorship impossible but democracy unbearable. "
Shimon Peres
Democracy
Impossible
Made
" He taught me literature, and he actually taught me how to read. He was my personal mentor. "
Shimon Peres
Personal
Literature
Me
" The older generation had greater respect for land than science. But we live in an age when science, more than soil, has become the provider of growth and abundance. Living just on the land creates loneliness in an age of globality. "
Shimon Peres
Live
Loneliness
Respect
" When it comes to the Sunnis and Shiites, it is not for the United States or for us or for anyone else to settle who was the heir of Muhammad. This is a Muslim and Arab problem, and they have to deal with it. "
Shimon Peres
Problem
Deal
Settle
" What is wrong with the Iranians in addition to the nuclear bomb? This is the only country on Earth in the 21st century that has renewed imperialistic ambitions. They really want to become the hegemon of the Middle East in an age that gave up imperialism. "
Shimon Peres
Earth
Imperialism
Want