Top 103 Quotes & Sayings by Reuven Rivlin - Page 2

The relationship between the Jews and Arabs is necessary to help build a bridge between Israelis and Palestinians.

It pains me to see the gap that exists in the public's consciousness - religious and secular - between the notion of Israel as a Jewish state and as a democratic state.

The Palestinians must understand that this is our home, to which we have returned, and we also have to understand that this is the homeland of all those born to it.

We have many candidates, like in reality television, but we don't really have a leader.

I see myself as a former politician, and in that capacity, I say to other politicians, 'Hold back.'

We are not fighting against the Palestinian people, and we are not at war with Islam. We are fighting against terrorism.

The extremists are talking too loudly, and everyone is convinced that only he is on the right side.

I don't see any possibility of peace if there won't be open borders between us and our neighbors.

There is one thing on which Arik will make no concessions: terrorism.

In the end, Arik believes in security above all and is a salient pragmatist, a disciple of Ben-Gurion.

The Knesset was right to limit the president's tenure to seven years.

I believe that our democratic values are also born out of our Jewish faith, a 'love for the stranger,' and equality before the law - these are not foreign values: this is Judaism.

I ask the members of the Knesset to be very strict about maintaining the principles of democracy.

We are one family, and the connection between all Jews, all over the world, is very important to the State of Israel.

It's preferable for the Palestinians to become citizens of the state than for us to divide the country.

The idea that the State of Israel could be democracy only for its Jewish citizens is unconscionable, and we must find a way to address this.

I hereby swear, in my name and that of all our descendants, that we will never act against the principle of equal rights, and we will never try and force someone from our land.

There are many Palestinians who believe there is no way to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. They call for the right of the return of refugees to Israel - something which is unacceptable for the consensus in Israel and which strikes at the very heart of this issue.

One cannot tell the High Court what to adjudicate. They must judge, and then the legislature must act accordingly.

Undoubtedly, a democratic state without an alternative is a danger to democracy itself.

Israeli society is comprised of four principal tribes growing closer in size.

The burden is on the Jewish majority in Israel to prove that the definition of their country as Jewish and democratic is not a contradiction.

My door will be open to everyone.

Whereas, in the personal realm, Sharon is a very sensitive person whose eyes often grow moist, in the national realm, he is entirely without emotions.

It can't be 'occupied territory' if the land is your own.

We must immediately find the way to come and say to the U.S., 'Despite the difficult differences of opinion between us, there are no closer friends, and no better allies than you to us, and we to you.'

Every opinion must be suffered. One must listen to what may be rousing, annoying, even shocking, but it must be done honestly, fairly and with equanimity, respecting the rights of every Member of the Knesset and each faction, guarding the minority in the face of the predatory majority.

Today, there are those who hallucinate that a democratic and Jewish state is only democratic for the Jews.

I wish to strengthen the hand of the Prime Minister and the heads of the security agencies in the unrelenting battle for our right to maintain normal daily life in every place in Israel.

The president is the face of the State of Israel around the world: not a representative of a specific ideology but of the collective creativity and history of the Jewish people.

There will never be peace unless we have open borders. But that does not mean open on our side and you continue to hit me on the other.

We need a broad government which will make decisions, but not a national unity government, because we are divided from within.

Arik is suffused with a mystical belief about Jerusalem.

When we come to the hospital to give birth, we don't come as a Jew or an Arab; we come as a human being.

The reality is that we only have one person whom the public sees as appropriate to be prime minister, and that's a shame. I think that if there were more, it would be better for everyone, including Netanyahu.

Those who know my stance on Israeli democracy also know that there is nothing more foreign to me than the rejection of a position different to my own.

Peres came with a worldview. I also came with a worldview that I have not abandoned and that guides me still.

A friendship between Germany and Israel didn't always seem natural.

There is no, and cannot be, any situation in which we don't respect the law and the judiciary. It is unacceptable to attack the courts; criticism is allowed, but attacks are not. It shakes the basis of our democracy.

The depth of this conflict, which is more than one hundred years old, requires us to find a way to communicate... so that the residents of the Middle East, Jews and Arabs alike, can live not as if they were forced to live together, but rather destined to live together.

The protesters, in Jerusalem and in Tel Aviv, revealed an open and raw wound at the heart of Israeli society, the pain of a community crying out over a sense of discrimination, racism, and of being unanswered.

There is no consensus in Israel regarding the two-state formula. We will not, under any circumstances, allow the establishment of a neighboring state that will be a genuine threat on our existence.

The extremists are talking too loudly, and everyone is convinced that only he is on the right side. It’s not just Jews against Arabs. It’s the Orthodox versus those who don’t think they can keep all six hundred and thirteen commandments of the Bible. It’s rich people versus poor people. At some point, something came over Israel so that everyone has his own ideas—and everyone else is an enemy. It’s a dialogue among deaf people and it is getting more and more serious.