ministers-of-defense-of-israel

"A bone stuck in our throats."

"I make it now clear: At the end of the war, Hamas will not control Gaza, there will be no civilian Israeli control in the Gaza Strip, and Tzahal will retain full military freedom of action."

"[Israel] will topple Hamas rule in Gaza. We will eliminate its military capability. We will make sure this threat doesn't exist on our border. It will take time, and it will be lethal, powerful and forever."

""The first rule of war is know your enemy, and Europe and the current American government are unwilling to define this war as against Islamist terrorism. If in Belgium they continue eating chocolate and enjoying life, and continue to appear as great democrats and liberals, they won't be aware that some Muslims in their country are organising terror, they won't be able to fight them." Israeli minister: Belgians who continue to eat chocolate, enjoy life can't fight terror"

"I have released all the restraints, we have (regained) control of the area, and we are moving to a full offense. You will have the ability to change the reality here. You have seen the prices (being paid), and you will get to see the change. Hamas wanted a change in Gaza; it will change 180 degrees from what it thought. They will regret this moment, Gaza will never go back to what it was. Whoever comes to decapitate, murder women, Holocaust survivors, we will eliminate him with all our might, and without compromise."

"I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly."

"We will increase our vigilance and readiness to thwart terror ... and will continue to take any measures necessary in facing terror groups in the area."

"I will do everything in my power to prevent a Palestinian state."

"If you catch terrorists, you have to simply kill them."

"“The land is ours”: that is pretty much the end of the debate. “I will do everything in my power, forever, to fight against a Palestinian state being founded in the Land of Israel.”"

"“These are the decisions that take real leadership,” he continued. “That we will never agree to give up Jerusalem, a united city under Israeli sovereignty, and only Israeli. We will not accept a terrorist Palestinian state, we will not accept an agreement based on the 67 lines. “We will not exchange territory as if we were doing cut-and-paste on some Word document on the computer. We will not agree to a border along Highway 6, meaning rockets on Highway 4. “We will not stay in a government that endangers our children’s future and divides our capital due to international pressure. We won’t sit in a government that makes the easy, and dangerous, decision,” he declared."

"Trump's victory is an opportunity for Israel to immediately retract the notion of a Palestinian state in the centre of the country, which would hurt our security and just cause."

"The era of a Palestinian state is over."

"If there's one thing that keeps me up at night, it's not Iran but the future of the Jews in America, and we have to fix this together. If we don't act urgently, we're going to be losing millions of Jews to assimilation."

"The world order as we know it is changing. The world is much less stable, and our region too is changing every day. These are difficult, tragic times. Our hearts are with the civilians of eastern Ukraine who were caught up in this situation."

"Are you seriously keep on asking me about Palestinian civilians [sic]? What's wrong with you?"

"Instead of whining for the past 80 years and building your own future, you have focused on killing the Jews. It’s time the Palestinians stopped whining."

"He is my nemesis. I never felt I would say that"

"Blathering away about how "we'll attack and destroy you" does not deter the decision-makers in Tehran, but it does drive the oil markets crazy... And who profits from that? Tehran."

"At the first stages of negotiations, we will not release prisoners with blood on their hands. However, as part of a final agreement, I do not rule out this option. Offering hope for a better future is more important than grieving the past."

"צריך לדאוג שלא יהיו פה פעולות ראווה ולא ענישה קולקטיווית, אבל הלגיטימציה שתהיה לי להילחם בטרור תהיה גדולה יותר מאשר של כל מועמד אחר"

"When my mother delivered me, she didn't have milk, and I was breastfed by an Arab woman. Maybe that had an effect on my leftist views."

"If a labor leader of national scale is arrested by the police, I will call a general strike."

"צריך להפסיק עם הדיבורים שאם נבנה עוד מפעלים, נצטרך לקנות פחות שניים שלושה אף-16. זה ממש לא שם. צריך קודם כל לקבוע את היעדים. בוא נקבע מה היעד, אני בטוח שנמצא לזה מקורות. ואם, לא תהיה בררה, ושאלת האף-16 תעמוד מול ערך האדם, אני אכריע לטובת האדם, ולא לטובת האף-16"

"The targeted assassination policy is a correct one. It is inconceivable that terrorists could operate freely without the ground quaking under their feet."

"אם לא תהיה ברירה, נכריז מלחמה נגד המליונרים במדינת ישראל. הקרקע כל כך בוערת, שעשירי הארץ לא יתפלאו אם יגיעו קבוצות שפשוט יעלו על הבתים שלהם, ויגרשו אותם מהבית, או שהבנות שלהם כבר לא יוכלו להסתובב בחוץ. כל אחד יצטרך להקים משטרה פרטית. כשיתחילו המאבקים, שמבהירים את העובדה שאי אפשר להמשיך במצב שבו יש קבוצות שצוברות הון ומתעשרות באופן אגדי, ואחרים שנשארים כל כך מאחור, שאף אחד לא ישלה את עצמו שהבית שלו והחצר שלו מחוץ למשחק"

"["DONALDSON: But on Friday, you were very pessimistic. You said, "No good," when someone asked you how things were going."] No, I'm saying even now, if I have to summarize the situation - in one word it's good, in two words, not good."

"אם הייתי פלסטיני בגיל המתאים, הייתי נכנס בשלב מסוים לאחד מארגוני הטרור...פעולות ארגוני הטרור הפלסטיני, הפוגעות בנשים וילדים הן חמורות, נבזיות ושפלות"

"[How is it consistent with what you advocated this evening in terms of a vision for peace, that you continued to allow the building of settlements in the West Bank, during your primeministership?] Let me tell you, first of all, during my term as a Prime Minister, we have not built a single new settlement. I ordered the dismantling of many voluntary -- I don't know how to call it -- new settlements that had been set on top of hills in different parts of the West Bank, basically. But, I allowed contracts, contracts that had been signed, legally, in Israel, beforehand. To build new neighborhoods in some big cities in the West Bank, cities with 25,000 or 30,000 people. And very few new homes, in small settlements, where youngsters, who came back from the army service, asked to build their home near the home of their parents. Now, Israel is a law-abiding state, you cannot break contracts, there is Supreme Court. If the government behaves in a way that is not proper, any individual can appeal and change whatever we decide. Realizing that this is a sensitive issue from the Palestinian side, I talked to Arafat, at the beginning of my term as a Prime Minister, and I told him: Mr. Chairman, I know that you are worried about it, it creates some problems, in your own constituency. But let me tell you, we have a great opportunity here to put an end to the whole conflict, in a year and a half. When President Clinton that invested unbelievable amount of energy and political capital in trying to solve it, and he's still in power. Now, I understand your problem with settlement if there is no end, there is no time limit, and you are afraid that maybe the accumulation of new settlements will change the nature of the situation, for the worse, from your position. So I tell you, out of our own considerations, independent of you, we have decided not to set even a single new settlement. We will not allow anyone to establish his own private initiatives on the hills, for our own reasons, not because of you. But at the same time I will respect any contract that has been signed, under law, in Israel. But -- and here is a point -- bearing in mind that we can put an end to the conflict, to reach an agreement within a year and a half, why the hell it will matter? To build a new building in Israel takes more than a year and a half, so you won't see any building that is not already emerging from the ground, having it's roof before we can reach an agreement. Now if such a building happens to be in a settlement that will become, under the agreement, part of the new independent Palestine, why the hell you have to care? Take it, use it, put some refugees in it. And if it will happen to be a part of what will be agreed, as Israel, in a mutual agreement that is signed by you, why the hell do you care, if you agree? I believe that that simple answer would not solve his public -- or internal political -- problems, but it would solve the real issue if the will was there to make peace, and not just to politically maneuver and manipulate."

"There is another story, that we tried to impose upon him [Arafat] cantons, Bantustans. Total lie. We talked about 80%+ of the West Bank and 100% of the Gaza Strip. How can it become non-contiguous? And if you have some reservation against this or that curl of the border, at some corner, come to the table, negotiate it, and demand that this will be removed. I can go with you more and more, and I cannot afford spending more time on it, but basically, all these were stories that were invented in order to explain to his own people, and maybe to try to convince honest people in the free world how come that such an opportunity had been missed. Of course, I had my own demands, to protect Israel, to ensure our security, to make sure that we know where do we head. I said loud and clear: we have to put an end to this asymmetric process where we are supposed to give tangible assets, and the Palestinians have just to give vague promises about the nature of future relationship. I said I'm ready to go very far, but I want to know, now, that there is a partner, which is ready and capable to make tough decisions, and painful decisions. I was a great supporter of the peace of the brave, but never a supporter of peace of ostriches, where you put your head in the sand, let whatever happen, happen, and then wake up and say, OK, that's what happened. We cannot afford this approach. That's the reality."

"This government needs to be brought down before it brings all of us down, there are no serious leaders left in the world who believe the Israeli government."

"What has happened is a hostile takeover of the Israeli government by dangerous elements. And it's just the beginning."

"Life-sustaining Zionism and the seeds of fascism cannot live together."

"The Left is acting like a young child, saying 'I want peace'... A child says 'I want candy right away,' an adult takes all of the factors into account and understands who he's dealing with."

"His knowledge of war has fed a passion for peace."