A nation writes its history in the image of its ideal.
ABBA EBANTragedy is the difference between what is and what could have been.
More Abba Eban Quotes
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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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Israel is not an aviary.
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Consensus is what many people say in chorus but do not believe as individuals.
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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.
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Tragedy is not what men suffer but what they miss.
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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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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.
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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.
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Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.
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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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You can’t achieve anything without getting in someone’s way. You can’t be detached and effective.
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Playing the game I have learned the meaning of humility. It has given me an understanding of futility of the human effort.
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Better to be disliked than pitied.
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Tragedy is the difference between what is and what could have been.
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History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.
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