Lest Arab governments be tempted out of sheer routine to rush into impulsive rejection, let me suggest that tragedy is not what men suffer but what they miss.
ABBA EBANNobody does Israel any service by proclaiming its ‘right to exist.’ Israel’s right to exist, like that of the United States, Saudi Arabia and 152 other states, is axiomatic and unreserved.
More Abba Eban Quotes
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Human beings act intelligently only after they have exhausted the alternatives
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A statesman who keeps his ear permanently glued to the ground will have neither elegance of posture nor flexibility of movement.
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A nation writes its history in the image of its ideal.
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It [idolatry] nourishes mans ambition to domineer over his fellow man. Idolatry, therefore, is the source of all social and moral evil in the world.
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You can’t achieve anything without getting in someone’s way. You can’t be detached and effective.
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Israel is not an aviary.
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If Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions.
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It is our experience that political leaders do not always mean the opposite of what they say.
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Tragedy is not what men suffer but what they miss.
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Salvation, the prophets tell us, is preconditioned by repentance. The redeeming act of God waits upon man’s initiative.
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His ignorance is encyclopedic.
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History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.
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I think that this is the first war in history that on the morrow the victors sued for peace and the vanquished called for unconditional surrender.
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Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.
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One of the chief tasks of any dialogue with the Gentile world is to prove that the distinction between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism is not a distinction at all.
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