It is the duty of the government to guarantee maximum security, and this is not an easy task.

We appreciate the efforts of the United States, of the president, of the secretary of state, and we are ready to find any form of talks, but we have to overcome the differences between Syria and Israel to reach peace.

I believe however that peace is attainable regardless of the Arabs mentality, society or government.

There is no way of finding the middle ground, even with the best intentions of the world. Our most sensible policy is to stall.

I think the fact that we have been focussing on politics quite a lot and the tumult of politics rather than what we should be doing in terms of policy has made, I think, voters quite grumpy.

I enter negotiations with Chairman Arafat, the leader of the PLO, the representative of the Palestinian people, with the purpose to have coexistence between our two entities, Israel as a Jewish state and Palestinian state, entity, next to us, living in peace.

One of my theories about why we've been cranky is Australians have been forced to focus on politics or party politics a little bit more than they normally would.