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Tragedy is the difference between what is and what could have been.

Abba Eban

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.
ABBA EBAN

Dialogue Distinction Task World
Zionism is nothing more, but also nothing less, than the Jewish People’s sense of origin and destination in the Land linked eternally with its name.
ABBA EBAN

Jewish Land More Nothing People
It is our experience that political leaders do not always mean the opposite of what they say.
ABBA EBAN

Experience Leader Leadership Mean Opposite Political
The Jews are the living embodiment of the minority, the constant reminder of what duties societies owe their minorities, whoever they might be.
ABBA EBAN

Constant Embodiment Jews Minority Reminder Society
Nobody 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.
ABBA EBAN

Country Nobody Proclaiming
You can’t achieve anything without getting in someone’s way. You can’t be detached and effective.
ABBA EBAN

Achievement Change Detached Effective Somehow Way
A nation writes its history in the image of its ideal.
ABBA EBAN

Diversity History Ideal Justice Nation Write Writing
Our intention to regard the closing of the Straits as a casus belli was communicated…to the foreign ministers of those states which had supported international navigation in the Straits in 1957 and thereafter.
ABBA EBAN

Cairo Closing Communicate Doubt Foreign Intention Minister Regard State Strait War
Human beings act intelligently only after they have exhausted the alternatives
ABBA EBAN

Alternatives Exhausted Human Intelligent
Better to be disliked than pitied.
ABBA EBAN

Better Dislike Wish
Science is not a sacred cow. Science is a horse. Don’t worship it. Feed it. [Addressing a group of prospective contributors to an Israeli scientific research program]
ABBA EBAN

Contribute Feed Group Horse Research Scared Science Worship
Salvation, the prophets tell us, is preconditioned by repentance. The redeeming act of God waits upon man’s initiative.
ABBA EBAN

God Initiative Men Prophet Salvation Waiting
Consensus is what many people say in chorus but do not believe as individuals.
ABBA EBAN

Belief Believe Chorus Individual People Say
Tragedy is not what men suffer but what they miss.
ABBA EBAN

Men Missing Suffering Tragedy
Tragedy is the difference between what is and what could have been.
ABBA EBAN

Could Difference Happen Tragedy
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.
ABBA EBAN

History Love Peace Sued Thinking Unconditional Victor War

Tragedy is the difference between what is and what could have been.

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Tragedy is the difference between what is and what could have been.

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