Shimon Peres Quotes

My heart goes out to the brave citizens of Syria, who each day risk and even sacrifice their lives to achieve freedom from a murderous regime. We in Israel welcome the historic struggle to forge democratic, peace-loving governments in our region.

I call on the Iranian people: it is not too late to replace the corrupt regime and return to your glorious Persian heritage, a heritage of culture and values and not of bombs and missiles ... How can a nation allow a regime to instill fear, take away the people's freedom and shock the young generation that seeks its way out of the dictatorial Iran.

Any assassination is an assassination. It's cold, it's terrible. I'm against any capital punishment. Only the Lord has the right to take away life because he's the giver of life. And assassination stands against democracy, against civilization, against a civilized life of people. Alas, the situation in Lebanon is very chaotic and many innocent people lost their lives because they have a state within a state, an army within an army and the respect for life is not high enough.

The present Arab uprising didn't stem from Israel. The old guard is trying to keep down the young chickens. The old guard is better organized. They may win elections, but unless they have a solution to poverty, to corruption, to oppression, they will not last. I am with the young people.

We should use our imagination more than our memory.

I was learning, as I did in the Ministry of Defense. I never knew, but I always learned.

Hamas married the Iranians. It was their choice. They are the same family.

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.

The Holocaust is a great warning to us all. We shall never forget our sisters and brothers. We have to ensure it is not repeated and to ensure we never go back to the days when humans behaved as beasts. Forgetfulness is a menace, we must remember.

A solution of two national states - a Jewish state, Israel; an Arab state, Palestine. The Palestinians are our closest neighbors. I believe they may become our closest friends.

We have to take care about nature as much as nature is taking care about us. Nature is very kind with us. And if you want to enjoy the gifts of nature and the promises of nature, we have to defer to nature and its needs, its rules, its norms.

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.

In the past, most wars were motivated by the idea of nationhood. Today, however, wars are incited above all using religion as an excuse.

It's better to be controversial for the right reasons, than to be popular for the wrong reasons.

I don't know what is stronger or what is weaker.The whole language of strength and weaknesses is irrelevant,because when you use arms you do not use ballots, and public opinion is unimportant, and they shoot at their opponents.

[Hamas] thought that if you go to elections you become a democrat for the rest of your life. They think that democracy is limited to one day in four years.

For me, dreaming is simply being pragmatic.

The history of Israel is divided into two parts. One, under attack that we have had to defend ourselves. When you defend yourself your thinking is totally different from when you want to make peace. So under attack you behave like if you want a hawk, when peace comes you become a dove.

When it becomes a bloody reality, we have to come together and look at what can be done to return to the order of peace, ... There is no alternative to it.

Historic justice has been done by killing Saddam.

Television has made dictatorship impossible but democracy unbearable.

People prefer remembering to imagining. Memory deals with familiar things; imagination deals with the unknown. Imagination can be frightening - it requires risking a departure from the familiar.

When I am speaking about American presidents, I have to speak about my very special relations with President Clinton. He contributed more to peace than anybody else in the American sense.

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.

It's a morality that keeps humans human.

If you have more dreams than achievements-you're young.

The problem of the Middle East is poverty more than politics.

Bringing an end to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians may help the young Arab generation to realise their aspirations. Israel is more than willing to offer our experience in building a modern economy in spite of limited resources to the whole region.

Look, I worked with American Republican presidents and Democratic presidents, all of them, and each of them has shown a deep and profound friendship to Israel, you know? I can't remember anybody who was in that sense negative as far as Israel is concerned.

The Jews' greatest contribution to history is dissatisfaction! We're a nation born to be discontented. Whatever exists we believe can be changed for the better.

In order to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear country you have to introduce a system of verification and inspection.

Today, the people are governing the governments. And when they begin to talk to each other, they are surprised, they can be friends. Why should we hate each other?

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.

The most important thing in life is to dare. The most complicated thing in life is to be afraid. The smartest thing in the world is to try to be a moral person.

The Middle East is ailing. The malady stems from pervasive violence, shortages of food, water and educational opportunities, discrimination against women and - the most virulent cause of all - the absence of freedom.

He taught me literature, and he actually taught me how to read. He was my personal mentor.

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.

You know when civilization began? With the invention of the mirror.

In the Middle East, the conflict today is a matter of generations and not of cultures.

Look, we have existed for 4,000 years - 2,000 years in diaspora, in exile. Nobody in the Middle East speaks their original language but Israel. When we started 64 years ago, we were 650,000 people. So, you know, we are maybe swimming a little bit against the stream, but we continue to swim.

Why cross and ocean when you can cross a river? Why should we sail to Washington when we can meet right away 10 miles from here?

I worked with a group of people who argued day and night - professors, officials, the Minister of Finance - but there were decisions that I had to make.

The Middle East is replete with both new and old threats. One should not underestimate these threats, but not be alarmed by them either. Israel is stronger today than ever.

Iran is a great problem, but not necessarily a great country. In fact, I think it is a very weak country.

Optimists and pessimists die the same way. They just live differently.

You can kill a thousand; you can bring an end to life; you cannot kill an idea.

When a friend makes a mistake, the friend remains a friend, and the mistake remains a mistake".

There are two things that cannot be achieved in life unless you close your eyes a little bit. And that's love and peace. If you want perfection you won't obtain either of them.

Terrorists and murderers are so dangerous. We shouldn't fall victim to believe that they are immune.

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.

The president of Iran should remember that Iran can also be wiped off the map.

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.

Now, I learned soon enough, that among the three, two don't trust the third one - the third one is the government. Both industry and unions feel the government is a talking organization and a spending organization.

Polls are like perfume-nice to smell, dangerous to swallow

We asked the workers to give up 25 percent of their salaries. Imagine! We asked the industrialists to freeze all costs, no matter what the inflation is.

One of the most important branches of the Egyptian economy is tourism. No bikinis, no tourism. So they have to decide what to do.

Look, Israel doesn't intend to introduce nuclear weapons, but if people are afraid that we have them, why not? It's a deterrent.

If you eat three times a day, you become fat. If you read three times a day, you become wise. It's better to be wise than fat.

To find a cause that's larger than yourself and then to give your life to it.

You're as young as your dreams, not as old as your calendar

In every war, there are always elements of blindness.

I don't think for example that the Indians look at [ what is right and whats wrong ] that way [the Palestinians do]. There are a billion, 200 million people in that part of the world. Why? They suffer from terror. People that do not suffer from it don't understand what I'm talking about, you know?

Israel is moving from the realm of poetry to the realm of prose.

If you eat three times a day you'll be fed but if you read three times a day you'll be wise.

I think peace should be done not only among governments but among people. It was impossible before the Facebook.

From my earliest youth, I have known that while one is obliged to plan with care the stages of one's journey, one is entitled to dream, and keep dreaming, of its destination.

The Iranian regime suppresses its own people as well as others in the region. It prevents peace by sponsoring terror globally. With the ultimate weapon that it is deceptively developing, the regime aims to gain hegemony over the entire Middle East and hold the world's economy hostage.

Leading the Jewish people is not easy
we are a divided, obstinate, highly individualistic people who have cultivated faith, sharp wittedness and polemics to a very high level.

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.

If a problem has no solution, it may not be a problem, but a fact - not to be solved, but to be coped with over time.