Yitzhak Shamir Quotes

Most of the Jewish refugees, stripped of their considerable possessions, came to Israel. They were welcomed by the Jewish state. They were given shelter and support, and they were integrated into Israeli society together with half a million survivors of the European Holocaust.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Everybody knows what I represent. My message is that Israel wants peace, and I am going to do everything possible to find ways to get this peace, this objective of all our people. All of us want peace. The differences are about the conditions of this peace.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Several hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs live in slums known as refugee camps in Gaza, Judea, and Somalia. Attempts by Israel to rehabilitate and oust them have been defeated by Arab objections. Nor has their fate been any better in Arab states.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Wars have not solved anything in our region. They have only caused misery, suffering, bereavement, and hatred.

- Yitzhak Shamir

In this part of the world, Jews and Arabs will live together forever.

- Yitzhak Shamir

The driving force for the Arabs is hatred of Israel. Hatred of the Jewish people.

- Yitzhak Shamir

There is a constant effort of the Palestinian terrorist organizations to increase their presence and their forces in Lebanon.

- Yitzhak Shamir

The Zionist movement gave political expression to our claim to the land of Israel. And in 1922, the League of Nations recognized the justice of this claim.

- Yitzhak Shamir

I said it several times: a blow you are getting from a friend is still a blow, but more painful.

- Yitzhak Shamir

The United States is our best friend, and our relations are excellent. Our relations will be strengthened even more, despite our differences in views.

- Yitzhak Shamir

The settlement of the Land of Israel is the essence of Zionism. Without settlement, we will not fulfill Zionism. It's that simple.

- Yitzhak Shamir

In their war against Israel's existence, the Arab governments took advantage of the Cold War. They enlisted the military, economic, and political support of the communist world against Israel, and they turned a local, regional conflict into an international powder keg.

- Yitzhak Shamir

You don't have to be desperate. Never be desperate. That is my slogan.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Even if there is peace with all the Arab states, I don't know if the terrorism against us will pass from this world.

- Yitzhak Shamir

I'm called a terrorist in the Arab media still today.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Only Arab Israel, the land of Israel, is our true homeland.

- Yitzhak Shamir

In its Declaration of Independence on May 15, 1948, Israel stretched out its hand in peace to its Arab neighbors, calling for an end to war and bloodshed. In response, seven Arab states invaded Israel. The U.N. resolution that partitioned the country was thus violated and effectively annulled.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Jews must be able to live with enemies and defend themselves from them. The hatred for Israel has not disappeared.

- Yitzhak Shamir

I feel alive inside only when obstacles are arising that must be overcome and eliminated.

- Yitzhak Shamir

When we fought for freedom, for the establishment of a Jewish state, we didn't send a questionnaire to the Jewish nation asking if it wanted a Jewish state.

- Yitzhak Shamir

After '45, Ben Gurion started to organize the Zionist movement and the conference in Baltimore. At this convention, they decided that the helm of the Zionist movement has to be a Jewish commonwealth... a Jewish commonwealth!

- Yitzhak Shamir

The U.N. did not create Israel. The Jewish state came into being because the tiny Jewish community in what was mandatory Palestine rebelled against foreign imperialist rule. We did not conquer a foreign land.

- Yitzhak Shamir

I believe that the will of the people is resolved by a strong leadership. Even in a democratic society, events depend on a strong leadership with a strong power of persuasion, and not on the opinion of the masses.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Lehi was not a part of the Zionist movement, not a part of the Revisionist Party. It was sometimes something apart, and Lord Moyne was the highest British official in the Middle East... and because we fought against the British in this area, we took him for a target.

- Yitzhak Shamir

I do not want to respond to leaks that concern things that have to do with state secrets of the first degree.

- Yitzhak Shamir

There is no better way to make peace than to talk in each other's home. Avoiding such talks is a denial of the purpose of the negotiations.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Israel's capital will never again be a divided city, a city with a wall at its center, a city in which two flags fly. This city, will, in its entirety, absorb immigrants, welcome pilgrims and be the eternal capital of Israel forever.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Israel's days without Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip are gone and will not return.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Stop exposing your children to danger by sending them to throw bombs and stones at soldiers and civilians.

- Yitzhak Shamir

If history remembers me at all, in any way, I hope it will be as a man who loved the Land of Israel and watched over it in every way he could, all his life.

- Yitzhak Shamir

Zionism is a revolutionary process. And in a revolution, you must be ready not to think too much about sentiments or human weaknesses.

- Yitzhak Shamir

We must never bend too much.

- Yitzhak Shamir

A man who goes forth to take the life of another whom he does not know must believe one thing only - that by his act he will change the course of history.

- Yitzhak Shamir

We have said that Israel has had a very bad history with the United Nations, and whoever cares for himself in Israel distances himself from that Organization.

- Yitzhak Shamir

The main aim of the Palestinians is to destroy the state of Israel.

- Yitzhak Shamir

I am miserable when everything is in order and quiet. Seriously, it's hard for me when I can go home quietly, go to sleep, and get up in the morning without fear and tension.

- Yitzhak Shamir

All of the land of Israel is ours.

- Yitzhak Shamir

I am not afraid of taking risks. We have to take risks for peace.

- Yitzhak Shamir