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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.

-Shimon Peres

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I Joined The Army

Shimon Peres

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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.

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We Checked Carefully The International Law - What Does A Nation Do When Terrorists Are Using Civilians To Defend Their Life, As A Shelter. And They Say You Do Not Have A Choice.

Without Freedom You Cannot Have Real Peace.

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There Is In England A Saying That An Anti-semite Is Someone Who Hates The Jews More Than Is Necessary.

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Historic Justice Has Been Done By Killing Saddam.

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And This Would Normalize The Existence Of The Israeli And The Jew: A Majority Of Jews In The Land Of Israel And A Majority Of Israelis Among The Jewish People.

In Many Ways, The Media Today Makes Dictatorship Impossible. But It Also Makes Democracy Intolerable.

The Uprising In Egypt Was Initiated By The Young Generation. The Uprising Achieved Two Things. One Is It Made The Lives Of Dictators Impossible. Today, If You Are Looking For A Safe Job, Don't Become A Dictator.

Young Generation

From My Earliest Youth, I Have Known That While One Is Obliged To Plan With Care The Stages Of One's Journey, One Is Entitled To Dream, And Keep Dreaming, Of Its Destination.

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Our Problem Is Not To Submit To The Differences But To Overcome Them.

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The Most Important Thing In Life Is To Dare. The Most Complicated Thing In Life Is To Be Afraid. The Smartest Thing In The World Is To Try To Be A Moral Person.

The Problem Of The Middle East Is Poverty More Than Politics.

He Taught Me Literature, And He Actually Taught Me How To Read. He Was My Personal Mentor.

You Know Who Is Against Democracy In The Middle East? The Husbands. They Got Used To Their Way Of Life. Now, The Traditional Way Of Life Must Change. Everybody Must Change. If You Don't Give Equal Rights To Women, You Can't Progress.

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I Think Peace Should Be Done Not Only Among Governments But Among People. It Was Impossible Before The Facebook.

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Positive Thinking

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Limited Resources

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In Israel, A Land Lacking In Natural Resources, We Learned To Appreciate Our Greatest National Advantage: Our Minds. Through Creativity And Innovation, We Transformed Barren Deserts Into Flourishing Fields And Pioneered New Frontiers In Science And Technology.

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Publishing House

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Young Generation

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The Minute You Try To Threaten And Use Boycotts I Think It Is Outside The Democratic Perception.

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Hamas Married The Iranians. It Was Their Choice. They Are The Same Family.

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We Have To Be Reasonable People.

Democracy Wants To Win By Reason, Not By Arms Or By Any Other Material Damage, Because, Look, I Don't Have To Remind You That I Am Totally For Peace. It Is My Greatest Dream. It Was And Will Remain So.

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The President Of Iran Should Remember That Iran Can Also Be Wiped Off The Map.

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[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 United States Is The Only Power In History That Became Great By Giving And Not By Taking. I Think The Crisis Was When The United States Had More Money Than Ideas. Money Doesn't Produce Money. Ideas Produce Money.

Israel Was Born Under The British Mandate. We Learned From The British What Democracy Means, And How It Behaves In A Time Of Danger, War And Terror. We Thank Britain For Introducing Freedom And Respect Of Human Rights Both In Normal And Demanding Circumstances.

We Are The Only Country Who Is An Ally Of The United States That Never Asked For American Soldiers.

You Can Kill A Thousand; You Can Bring An End To Life; You Cannot Kill An Idea.

Governments Have Budgets But No Money, Companies Have Money But No Budgets.

I Do Not Know Anybody That Is Threatening Iran. It Is A Safe Country.

We Should Use Our Imagination More Than Our Memory.

What Should Be The Future Of Israel? Is The Land The Most Important Choice, And For That Reason To Keep The Whole Of The Land At Any Cost, Or To Have A Partition And Build The Jewish State On Part Of The Land? And The Other Part?

Important Choices

I Worked With A Group Of People Who Argued Day And Night - Professors, Officials, The Minister Of Finance - But There Were Decisions That I Had To Make.

Until The Yom Kippur War, In 1973, Until Then Israel Didn't Have A Chance But To Fight For Her Life. We Were Attacked Five Times, Outgunned, Outnumbered, On A Small Piece Of Land, And Our Main Challenge Was To Remain Alive.

It's Better To Be Controversial For The Right Reasons, Than To Be Popular For The Wrong Reasons.

Germany And Israel Should Dream Together For A Middle East In Which All The Countries Are Willing To Exchange The Dispute Of The Parents With Peace For Their Children.

It's A Morality That Keeps Humans Human.

Now, I Learned Soon Enough, That Among The Three, Two Don't Trust The Third One - The Third One Is The Government. Both Industry And Unions Feel The Government Is A Talking Organization And A Spending Organization.

I Think I Was A Good Student, Because I Jumped Over A School. My Main Interest Was Basically History And Literature. Sports Were Basically Basketball And Swimming At A Pool. I Was So Happy.

For Me, Dreaming Is Simply Being Pragmatic.

One Of The Most Important Branches Of The Egyptian Economy Is Tourism. No Bikinis, No Tourism. So They Have To Decide What To Do.

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