If we thought that instead of 200 Palestinian fatalities, 2,000 dead would put an end to the fighting at a stroke, we would use much more force.

The Arab leaders, they don't have a love affair with the Palestinians or the Palestinian leadership, but the publics have, and they cannot feel safe in their own chairs if they accept Israel, the mistress, so to speak, to acknowledge her as a main, the Unter den Linden, the main road, as long as we are not moving forward with the Palestinians.

I compare the Middle East to a big condominium, we called shared residence? Well, you have many families that you don't like; some of them are bad families. But, unlike in a condominium, you are doomed to be with your neighbors; a person cannot choose his parents, and a nation cannot choose its neighbors, they were both there. One of them which happened to be quite problematic, short of perfect, called the Palestinians. So we have problems with them.

I can tell you I also smoked cigars 10 years before, and the watch, which is a Patek Philippe - it was my former wife who bought it for me as a gift when I completed my military service. What is all of this about anyway? I'm no wealthier than Bibi Netanyahu or Arik Sharon. I don't feel that I'm more hedonistic than Ehud Olmert, or Yitzhak Rabin or Shimon Peres.

I want to study, to write to live and have a good time.

For three years now, probably more, there is a clear common interest developed between Israel and the leading Sunni moderate entities. The Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan. And the common interest is to block radical Muslim terror, to counter the Iranian hegemonic and nuclear intentions, and to join hands in a huge infrastructure project from water, energy, transportation, whatever, in the whole Middle East.

In Israel, generally speaking, politics is much more familiar than any other place. We all know each other.