I love conducting. What I'm tired of is music administration. I don't want that. I just want to make music.

I don't believe that the entire world is constantly anti-Semitic.

Germany will never be a real, free thinking and free feeling friend of Israel, because it will always fall under this shadow.

To have real knowledge, one must understand the essence of things and not only their manifestations.

In times of totalitarian or autocratic rule, music (indeed culture in general) is often the only avenue of independent thought. It is the only way people can meet as equals, and exchange ideas. Culture then becomes primarily the voice of the oppressed and it takes over from politics as a driving force for change.

I hope that my new status will be an example of Israeli-Palestinian co-existence, I believe that the destinies of the Israeli people and the Palestinian people are inextricably linked.

Anti-Semitism has no historical, political and certainly no philosophical origins. Anti-Semitism is a disease.