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.

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

[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.

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

You don't make peace with friends. You make it with very unsavory enemies.

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.

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.