Ariel Sharon Quotes

One must remember that the Jews have one, tiny country, the only place they have the right and capability to defend themselves by themselves. And it is our duty and my responsibility to see that we will never compromise about that.

It is impossible to have a Jewish, democratic state and at the same time to control all of Eretz Israel. If we insist on fulfilling the dream in its entirety, we are liable to lose it all. Everything. That is where the extremist path takes us.

I don't think I have accomplished what I still have to accomplish. There is one thing that I would like to do, and that's to bring security and peace to the Jewish people.

I am 73 years old. I've seen everything. I've met the kings, the queens, the presidents, I've been around the world. I have one thing that I would like to do: to try to reach peace.

Myself, first of all, I am a Jew. And that is the most important thing for me.

Israel is a wonderful country. It's a beautiful country. It is ours. But it is a country with 10,000 problems that we have to solve and deal.

I cannot deny that I have doubts, reservations and fears. However, I have come to the conclusion that in the present regional and international reality, Israel must act with courage to accept the political plan which I described.

Even today I am willing to volunteer to do the dirty work for Israel, to have everyone hate us, to pull the rug from underneath the feet of the Diaspora Jews, so that they will be forced to run to us crying. Even if it means blowing up one or two synagogues here and there, I don’t care.

We extend our hand towards peace. Our people are committed to peace. We know that peace entails painful compromise for both sides.

Everybody has to move, run and grab as many [Palestinian] hilltops as they can to enlarge the [Jewish] settlements because everything we take now will stay ours... Everything we don't grab will go to them.

It is the duty of Israeli leaders to explain to public opinion, clearly and courageously, a certain number of facts that are forgotten with time. The first of these is that there is no Zionism, colonialization, or Jewish State without the eviction of the Arabs and the expropriation of their lands.

On April 19 1943, the Bermuda conference gathered, with the participation of representatives from Britain and the United States, in order to discuss saving the Jews of Europe. In fact, the participants did everything in their power to avoid dealing with the problem.

To the citizens of Israel, I say: We have passed difficult years, faced the most painful experiences and overcome them. The future lies before us. We are required to take difficult and controversial steps, but we must not miss the opportunity to try to achieve what we have wished for, for so many years: security, tranquillity and peace.

I believe that the Jewish state will exist forever.

You don't simply bundle people onto trucks and drive them away...I prefer to advocate a positive policy, to create, in effect, a condition that in a positive way will induce people to leave.

All together, we know for many years that terror is the most dangerous thing for local, regional and international stability.

Iran, Libya and Syria are irresponsible states, which must be disarmed of weapons of mass destruction, and a successful American move in Iraq as a model will make that easier to achieve.

Israel may have the right to put others on trial, but certainly no one has the right to put the Jewish people and the State of Israel on trial.

We don't have any intention whatsoever to use military force to solve the Palestinian problem. But when it comes to terror - when it comes to terror, I believe that military - the right military steps is a very, very complicated kind of warfare, where I make every effort not to escalate the situation.

Aliyah is the central goal of the State of Israel.

The strength that I have comes from irrigating the citrus plantation, ploughing in the vineyard, guarding the melon fields at night. I believe that's what gave me the strength.

I cannot say that the attitude of the United Nations always is for the Israeli attitude. Israel, I think, has been under severe attacks by members of the United Nations many times.

What you see from here is not what you see from there.

I don't care what the American people think, I own the congress!

In Lebanon, there was an agreement not to liquidate Yasser Arafat. In principle, I'm sorry that we didn't liquidate him.

Like all Israelis, I yearn for peace. I see the utmost importance in taking all possible steps that will lead to a solution of the conflict with the Palestinians.

I am the last person who would divide Jerusalem. I have said this many times. I don't plan to discuss any division of Jerusalem.

Every time we do something you tell me America will do this and will do that . . . I want to tell you something very clear: Don't worry about American pressure on Israel. We, the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it.

We have evidence that Iran makes a reactor to possess nuclear weapons.

People need to know why we, as the Jewish people, have a right to be here. We need to tell people what we are doing here... My tourism guidebook is the Bible.

A lie should be tried in a place where it will attract the attention of the world.

I begin with the basic conviction that Jews and Arabs can live together. I have repeated that at every opportunity, not for journalists and not for popular consumption, but because I have never believed differently or thought differently, from my childhood on. ... I know that we are both inhabitants of the land, and although the state is Jewish, that does not mean that Arabs should not be full citizens in every sense of the word.

You cannot like the word, but what is happening is an occupation - to hold 3.5 million Palestinians under occupation. I believe that is a terrible thing for Israel and for the Palestinians.

I vow that if I was just an Israeli civilian and I met a Palestinian I would burn him and I would make him suffer before killing him.

My strength never came from political echelons, it came from the family. And from the fields and the lands and the flowers and everything I see there. My strength came from there.

My mood altered and the pain turned to rage.

If there will be a serious Palestinian prime minister who makes a 100 percent effort to end terrorism, then we can have peace. Each side has to take steps. If terror continues, there will not be an independent Palestinian state. Israel will not accept it, if terror continues.

Our hearts are with you and we are ready to provide any assistance at any time....This is a war between good and evil and between humanity and the bloodthirsty.

The ongoing conflict between us has caused heavy suffering to both peoples. The future can and must be different. Both our peoples are destined to live together side by side, on this small piece of land. This reality we cannot change.

I was born on a farm. My strength has nothing to do with political apparatus. I get my strength from nature, from flowers.

When I was born here on one of the farms in Israel, my childhood, I never thought for one day that we will not be living together with Arabs.

Arabs may have the oil, but we have the matches.

We do not build new Jewish communities in Samaria, Judea and Gaza. The United States has never accepted our building of communities or of the fence. Yet, I've managed to develop relations between Israel and the United States even though President Bush never supported settlements.

As a Jew, it is my historic responsibility to defend the Jewish people. I feel this responsibility for the survival of the Jewish people. We're not going to accept any decision by anybody else about security of the State of Israel. It is our role and only our role.

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.

I know I have been portrayed as a general looking for war. Many other headlines speak of that. That's what people say. But I understand the importance of peace because I saw the horrors of war. That's how I see it. I lost my best friends in battles.. and I had to make decisions of life and death, of others and myself.

Netanyahu is pressured easily, gets into a panic, and loses his senses... to run a country like Israel a leader needs to have reason and judgment and nerves of steel, two traits he does not have.

The sad and horrible conclusion is that no one cared that Jews were being murdered... This is the Jewish lesson of the Holocaust and this is the lesson which Auschwitz taught us.