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Benjamin Netanyahu

Prime Minister of Israel (1996–1999, 2009–2021, 2022–present)

Benjamin Netanyahu (born 21 October 1949), often called "Bibi", is an Israeli politician who has served as the 9th prime minister of Israel since 29 December 2022 (he was previously in office from 31 March 2009 to 13 June 2021) and is chairman of the Israeli Likud Party.

History has shown us time and again that what is right is not what is popular.
The difference between us is that we're using missile defense to protect our civilians and they're using their civilians to protect their missiles.
I will plant them upon their soil never to be uprooted again. Ladies and gentlemen, the people of Israel have come home never to be uprooted again.
The root cause of terrorism lies not in grievances but in a disposition toward unbridled violence. This can be traced to a world view which asserts that certain ideological and religious goals justify, indeed demand, the shedding of all moral inhibitions.
When we say never again, we mean never again! Israel always reserves the right to defend itself.
I can guarantee you this, the days when the Jewish people remained passive in the face of genocidal enemies, those days are over!
We'll attack anyone who tries to harm our citizens.
Even if Israel has to stand alone, Israel will stand. But I know that Israel does not stand alone. I know that America stands with Israel.
We will bring a comprehensive plan to the government to assist you in every way. There is no room for racism and discrimination in our society, none... We will turn racism into something contemptible and despicable.
I know what America is. America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction. They won't get in our way.
See also his books:
A Durable Peace: Israel and Its Place Among the Nations
Bibi My Story (2022)

Quotes

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1980s

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  • The root cause of terrorism lies not in grievances but in a disposition toward unbridled violence. This can be traced to a world view which asserts that certain ideological and religious goals justify, indeed demand, the shedding of all moral inhibitions.
    • As quoted in "Terrorism: How the West Can Win" (1987), Awakeǃ, 1/8.

1990s

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  • This is the heart of the Israeli consensus. This is an area in which Jews lived up until 1948. They were expelled after a great massacre took place there. The sons of the very people who lived on these very hills came back and rebuilt these communties. There's a very broad Israeli consensus about this and in fact what we are doing in Efrat, we are effectively building in the most prudent and the most careful and I think in the most responsible way. We are niot going a hill too far, two hills, a kilometre, two kilometres away, in some kind of land-grab. What we are doing is simply continuing the construction as the community gets larger, it's people have children. As the number of families increase, we facilitate the construction close to the last construction that was already standing.

2000s

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2001

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  • But then the question came up of just who would define what Defined Military Sites were. I received a letter – to my and to Arafat, at the same time – which said that Israel, and only Israel, would be the one to define what those are, the location of those military sites and their size. Now, they did not want to give me that letter, so I did not give the Hebron Agreement. I stopped the government meeting, I said: “I’m not signing.” Only when the letter came, in the course of the meeting, to my and to Arafat, only then did I sign the Hebron Agreement. Or rather, ratify it, it had already been signed. Why does this matter? Because at that moment I actually stopped the Oslo Accord.
  • I am certain that I speak on behalf of my entire nation when I say: Today we are all Americans — in grief, as in defiance.
    • Statement on the September 11th terrorist attacks (20 September 2001), as quoted at the official site of Israeli embassy

2006

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2008

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2009

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  • "I came here tonight to talk about the agreement and security that are broad consensus within Israeli society. This is what guides our policy. This policy must take into account the international situation. We have to recognize international agreements but also principles important to the State of Israel. I spoke tonight about the first principle - recognition. Palestinians must truly recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people. The second principle is demilitarization. Any area in Palestinian hands has to be demilitarization, with solid security measures. Without this condition, there is a real fear that there will be an armed Palestinian state which will become a terrorist base against Israel, as happened in Gaza. We do not want missiles on Petah Tikva, or Grads on the Ben-Gurion international airport. We want peace."

2010s

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2010

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  • I know what America is. America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction. They won't get in our way. … They asked me before the election if I'd honor [the Oslo accords] … I said I would, but … I'm going to interpret the accords in such a way that would allow me to put an end to this galloping forward to the '67 borders. How did we do it? Nobody said what defined military zones were. Defined military zones are security zones; as far as I'm concerned, the entire Jordan Valley is a defined military zone. Go argue.
  • We'll attack anyone who tries to harm our citizens.

2011

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  • In recent days we witness attempts to break this coexistence apart. Today, for example, I have heard of an attempt to move a woman from her seat on a bus. I oppose this unequivocally. I believe we must not allow margins groups to break our common denominator and we must keep our public spaces open and safe for all of our citizens. We must find the uniting and mediating ground rather than the things that divide and separate us.
  • Israel has extended its hand in peace from the moment it was established... In Israel our hope for peace never wanes. Our scientists, doctors, and innovators apply their genius to improve the world of tomorrow. Our artists, our writers, enrich the heritage of humanity. Now, I know that this is not exactly the image of Israel that is often portrayed...
Address to joint meeting of the U.S. Congress (May 2011)
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  • Israel has no better friend than America. And America has no better friend than Israel. We stand together to defend democracy. We stand together to advance peace. We stand together to fight terrorism. Congratulations America. Congratulations, Mister President. You got bin Laden. Good riddance!
  • You don't need to do nation building in Israel, we're already built. You don't need to export democracy to Israel, we've already got it. You don't need to send American troops to Israel, we defend ourselves... Israel is not what is wrong about the Middle East, Israel is what is right about the Middle East... The tyranny in Tehran brutalizes its own people. It supports attacks against American troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. It subjugates Lebanon and Gaza. It sponsors terror worldwide... A nuclear-armed Iran would ignite a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. It would give terrorists a nuclear umbrella. It would make the nightmare of nuclear terrorism a clear and present danger throughout the world. I want you to understand what this means. They could put the bomb anywhere. They could put it on a missile. It could be on a container ship in a port, or in a suitcase on a subway... Now the threat to my country cannot be overstated. Those who dismiss it are sticking their heads in the sand. Less than seven decades after six million Jews were murdered, Iran's leaders deny the Holocaust of the Jewish people, while calling for the annihilation of the Jewish state. Leaders who spew such venom, should be banned from every respectable forum on the planet. But there is something that makes the outrage even greater: The lack of outrage. In much of the international community, the calls for our destruction are met with utter silence. It is even worse because there are many who rush to condemn Israel for defending itself against Iran's terror proxies... When we say never again, we mean never again! Israel always reserves the right to defend itself... In Judea and Samaria, the Jewish people are not foreign occupiers. We are not the British in India. We are not the Belgians in the Congo. This is the land of our forefathers, the Land of Israel, to which Abraham brought the idea of one God, where David set out to confront Goliath, and where Isaiah saw a vision of eternal peace... No distortion of history can deny the four thousand year old bond, between the Jewish people and the Jewish land... Peace cannot be imposed. It must be negotiated. But it can only be negotiated with partners committed to peace.

2012

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  • Fortunately, President Obama and most world leaders understand that the idea that Iran's goal is not to develop nuclear weapons is ridiculous. Yet incredibly, some are prepared to accept an idea only slightly less preposterous: That we should accept a world in which the Ayatollahs have atomic bombs. Sure, they say, Iran is cruel, but it's not crazy. It's detestable but it's deterrable. Responsible leaders should not bet the security of their countries on the belief that the world's most dangerous regime won't use the world's most dangerous weapons. And I promise you that as Prime Minister, I will never gamble with the security of Israel. From the beginning, the Ayatollah regime has broken every international rule and flouted every norm. It has seized embassies, targeted diplomats and sent its own children through mine fields. It hangs gays and stones women. It supports Assad's brutal slaughter of the Syrian people. Iran is the world's foremost sponsor of terror. It sponsors Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza and terrorists throughout the Middle East, Africa, and South America. Iran's proxies have dispatched hundreds of suicide bombers, planted thousands of roadside bombs, and fired over twenty thousand missiles at civilians. Through terror from the skies and terror on the ground, Iran is responsible for the murder of hundreds, if not thousands, of Americans. In 1983, Iran's proxy Hezbollah blew up the Marine barracks in Lebanon, killing 240 American servicemen. In the last decade, its been responsible for murdering and maiming American soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq. Just a few months ago, it tried to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador in a restaurant just a few blocks from here. The assassins didn't care that several Senators and members of Congress would have been murdered in the process. Iran accuses the American government of orchestrating 9/11, and it denies the Holocaust. Iran brazenly calls for Israel's destruction, and they work for its destruction – each day, every day. This is how Iran behaves today, without nuclear weapons. Think of how they will behave tomorrow, with nuclear weapons. Iran will be even more reckless and far more dangerous.
  • They say that a military confrontation with Iran would undermine the efforts already underway, that it would be ineffective, and that it would provoke even more vindictive action by Iran. I've heard these arguments before. In fact, I've read them before. In my desk, I have copies of an exchange of letters between the World Jewish Congress and the US War Department. The year was 1944. The World Jewish Congress implored the American government to bomb Auschwitz. The reply came five days later. I want to read it to you: “Such an operation could be executed only by diverting considerable air support essential to the success of our forces elsewhere... and in any case would be of such doubtful efficacy that it would not warrant the use of our resources”... And here's the most remarkable sentence of all. And I quote: "Such an effort might provoke even more vindictive action by the Germans." Think about that – "even more vindictive action” — than the Holocaust.
    • Speech at AIPAC Policy Conference in March 2012 [3]
  • The Czech Republic stood with the U.S., Canada and a handful of other countries against the prevailing international current, but history has shown us time and again that what is right is not what is popular.

2013

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  • Hatred of the Jews has changed form but it still remains. If not racial superiority, then religious superiority is the order of the day. The world's indifference in light of this hatred has also remained. The world has very quickly become accustomed to hearing declarations only 65 years after the Holocaust, declarations of intent to annihilate millions of Jews – and the world continues to act in the same manner. The hesitancy of enlightened countries to act against extreme regimes which threaten us and threaten world peace – this too has not changed. The only thing that has truly changed is our ability and our determination to act to defend ourselves and prevent another Holocaust. This truth is a source of heavy and constant responsibility – to ensure by any means necessary the future and security of the State of Israel against those who seek our destruction. This is the last will and testament of the six million, our brothers and sisters who perished in the Holocaust and it is our duty – and we will carry it out.
  • In our time the Biblical prophecies are being realized. As the prophet Amos said, they shall rebuild ruined cities and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards and drink their wine. They shall till gardens and eat their fruit. And I will plant them upon their soil never to be uprooted again. Ladies and gentlemen, the people of Israel have come home never to be uprooted again.
    • Netanyahu speech at the UN General Assembly 1 October 2013 [5].

2014

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  • The difference between us is that we're using missile defense to protect our civilians and they're using their civilians to protect their missiles.
    • Interview on CBS' "Face the Nation" 12 July 2014 [6]. Comparing Israeli forces to Hamas militants.
  • I think the Israeli people understand now what I always say: that there cannot be a situation, under any agreement, in which we relinquish security control of the territory west of the River Jordan... We will defend ourselves on every front, defensively and offensively.
  • As Hamas's charter makes clear, Hamas's immediate goal is to destroy Israel. But Hamas has a broader objective. They also want a caliphate. Hamas shares the global ambitions of its fellow militant Islamists. That’s why its supporters wildly cheered in the streets of Gaza as thousands of Americans were murdered on 9/11. And that's why its leaders condemned the United States for killing Osama bin Laden, whom they praised as a holy warrior.

    So when it comes to their ultimate goals, Hamas is ISIS and ISIS is Hamas. And what they share in common, all militant Islamists share in common. Boko Haram in Nigeria; Ash-Shabab in Somalia; Hezbollah in Lebanon; An-Nusrah in Syria; The Mahdi Army in Iraq; And the Al-Qaeda branches in Yemen, Libya, the Philippines, India and elsewhere. Some are radical Sunnis, some are radical Shi'ites. Some want to restore a pre-medieval caliphate from the 7th century. Others want to trigger the apocalyptic return of an imam from the 9th century. They operate in different lands, they target different victims and they even kill each other in their quest for supremacy. But they all share a fanatic ideology. They all seek to create ever expanding enclaves of militant Islam where there is no freedom and no tolerance – Where women are treated as chattel, Christians are decimated, and minorities are subjugated, sometimes given the stark choice: convert or die. For them, anyone can be an infidel, including fellow Muslims. Ladies and Gentlemen, Militant Islam's ambition to dominate the world seems mad. But so too did the global ambitions of another fanatic ideology that swept to power eight decades ago. The Nazis believed in a master race. The militant Islamists believe in a master faith. They just disagree about who among them will be the master... of the master faith. That's what they truly disagree about. Therefore, the question before us is whether militant Islam will have the power to realize its unbridled ambitions.

    • Speech at the United Nations General Assembly (September 2014), New York City, New York.
    • As quoted in The Jerusalem Post.

2015

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  • We will bring a comprehensive plan to the government to assist you in every way. There is no room for racism and discrimination in our society, none... We will turn racism into something contemptible and despicable.
  • Amos Regev, the editor-[in-chief] of Israel HaYom, is a personal friend and my conversations with him are not within the framework of my job.
    • Response to an FOI request by Haaretz on ties between Netanyahu and the management of Israel's largest newspaper (11 June 2015) [7]
  • this attack and other attacks on the Jewish community in 1920, 1921, 1929, were instigated by a call of the Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini,
    who was later sought for war crimes in the Nuremberg trials because he had a central role in fomenting the final solution.
    He flew to Berlin.
    Hitler didn't want to exterminate the Jews at the time, he wanted to expel the Jews.
    And Haj Amin al-Husseini went to Hitler and said, "If you expel them, they'll all come here."
    "So what should I do with them?" he asked.
    He said, "Burn them."
    And he was sought in, during the Nuremberg trials for prosecution.
    He escaped it and later died of cancer, after the war, died of cancer in Cairo.
  • The labeling of products of the Jewish state by the European Union brings back dark memories. Europe should be ashamed of itself. It took an immoral decision. Of the hundreds of territorial conflicts around the world, it chose to single out Israel and Israel alone, while it's fighting with its back against the wall against the wave of terror.
Address to the United States Congress (March 2015)
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Full text of address to a joint meeting of the United States Congress (3 March 2015).
  • The people of Iran are very talented people. They're heirs to one of the world's great civilizations. But in 1979, they were hijacked by religious zealots; religious zealots who imposed on them immediately a dark and brutal dictatorship. That year, the zealots drafted a constitution, a new one for Iran. It directed the revolutionary guards not only to protect Iran's borders, but also to fulfill the ideological mission of jihad. The regime's founder, Ayatollah Khomeini, exhorted his followers to "export the revolution throughout the world." I'm standing here in Washington, D.C. and the difference is so stark. America's founding document promises life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Iran's founding document pledges death, tyranny, and the pursuit of jihad. And as states are collapsing across the Middle East, Iran is charging into the void to do just that.
  • The difference is that ISIS is armed with butcher knives, captured weapons and YouTube, whereas Iran could soon be armed with intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear bombs. We must always remember. I'll say it one more time; the greatest dangers facing our world is the marriage of militant Islam with nuclear weapons. To defeat ISIS and let Iran get nuclear weapons would be to win the battle, but lose the war. We can't let that happen.
  • If Iran's work on advanced centrifuges, faster and faster centrifuges, is not stopped, that break-out time could still be shorter, a lot shorter. True, certain restrictions would be imposed on Iran's nuclear program and Iran's adherence to those restrictions would be supervised by international inspectors. But here's the problem. You see, inspectors document violations; they don't stop them. Inspectors knew when North Korea broke to the bomb, but that didn't stop anything. North Korea turned off the cameras, kicked out the inspectors. Within a few years, it got the bomb. Now, we're warned that within five years North Korea could have an arsenal of 100 nuclear bombs. Like North Korea, Iran, too, has defied international inspectors. It's done that on at least three separate occasions; 2005, 2006, 2010. Like North Korea, Iran broke the locks, shut off the cameras.
  • I wish I could promise you, Elie, that the lessons of history have been learned. I can only urge the leaders of the world not to repeat the mistakes of the past. Not to sacrifice the future for the present; not to ignore aggression in the hopes of gaining an illusory peace. But I can guarantee you this, the days when the Jewish people remained passive in the face of genocidal enemies, those days are over! We are no longer scattered among the nations, powerless to defend ourselves. We restored our sovereignty in our ancient home. And the soldiers who defend our home have boundless courage. For the first time in 100 generations, we, the Jewish people, can defend ourselves. This is why; this is why, as a prime minister of Israel, I can promise you one more thing: Even if Israel has to stand alone, Israel will stand. But I know that Israel does not stand alone. I know that America stands with Israel. know that you stand with Israel. You stand with Israel, because you know that the story of Israel is not only the story of the Jewish people but of the human spirit that refuses again and again to succumb to history's horrors. Facing me right up there in the gallery, overlooking all of us in this august chamber is the image of Moses. Moses led our people from slavery to the gates of the Promised Land. And before the people of Israel entered the land of Israel, Moses gave us a message that has steeled our resolve for thousands of years.

2016

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  • I, the Prime Minister of Israel, care more about Palestinians than their own leaders do. Israel cares more about Palestinians than their own leaders do.
  • Innocent and impoverished Palestinians were denied vital aid supplied from nations around the world, Hamas stole critical support for Palestinian children so that they could kill our children…I express my deepest sympathy with innocent Palestinians and those well-meaning nations who generously donated money to help them.

2017

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  • We also understand the pain of our American brothers & sisters, who are marking today an event of enormous magnitude - the Sept. 11 bombings

2018

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  • Shimon aspired toward peace but he knew that true peace can be achieved only if our hands strongly grasp defensive weaponry. In the Middle East, and in many parts of the world, there is a simple truth: There is no place for the weak. The weak crumble, are slaughtered and are erased from history while the strong, for good or for ill, survive. The strong are respected, and alliances are made with the strong, and in the end peace is made with the strong. This process, of normalization by leading countries in the Arab world with the strong State of Israel, is happening before our eyes on a scale that would have been impossible to imagine a few years ago. This process bears hope within it that, in the end, the cycle of peace will be completed. But it is impossible to deny the fact that there are yet many enemies in this region and beyond.

2019

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  • רה"מ נתניהו: "מכאן אני הולך למפגש עם 60 שרי חוץ ונציגים של מדינות בעולם נגד איראן. מה שחשוב זה המפגש, ומפגש לא בסתר ולא בהיחבא, כי כאלו יש הרבה. זהו למעשה מפגש גלוי עם נציגים של מדינות ערביות מובילות שיושבות יחד עם ישראל כדי לקדם את האינטרס המשותף של מלחמה באיראן".
    • 8:43 AM 13 January 2019
      • Google Translate: From here I am going to meet with 60 foreign ministers and representatives of countries around the world against Iran. What is important is the encounter, and a meeting not secretly or secretly, because there are many. This is in fact an open meeting with representatives of leading Arab countries that sit with Israel to advance the common interest of a war in Iran.
  • Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas.
  • This is part of our strategy – to isolate the Palestinians in Gaza from the Palestinians in the West Bank.
  • A great sense of mission guides us. A great sense of mission guides me. I act day and night in your name, on your behalf, on behalf of our country, on behalf of our people, on behalf of our land!
    • As quoted in, All 3 Major Israeli TV Channels Declare Netanyahu Victor In Election, April 9 2019, The Daily Wire
  • I believe, so I was taught, by my late father Prof. Benzion Netanyahu, and so he was taught by my grandfather of blessed memory, Rabbi Natan Milikowsky Netanyahu, I believe that the Holy One Blessed Be He and history have given the Jewish people another opportunity, a golden opportunity, to turn our country into a strong nation, one of the strongest nations of the world and it is to that end that I do what I do. A strong country, a country in which it is good to live, a country that it is good and safe to live in, for our sake and for the sake of the coming generations, for the sake of the eternal Israel.
    • As quoted in, All 3 Major Israeli TV Channels Declare Netanyahu Victor In Election, April 9 2019, The Daily Wire

2020s

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2020

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  • In the first day of the fighting, America's new president, Joe Biden, called me. We had known each other for close to forty years, from the time we both came to Washington, he as young senator from Delaware, and I as deputy chief of Israel's embassy to the United States. Four days after the 2020 elections Biden was declared president-elect. In the twenty four hours after that declaration I followed twenty other world leaders in offering my congratulations. This elicited the ire of President Trump, who to this day believes that I was the first to do so.
    • Bibi My Story (2022), p. 646 Chapter 64 Roller Coaster 2019-2022

2022

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  • In Madrid, Palestinian spokeswoman Hanan Ashrawi and I also sparred it out in endless television appearances that were broadcast around the world. She was a worthy opponent.
Thirty years later, she resigned from her position in the Palestinian Authority, explaining that "it's not a question of peace,. It's a question of democratization. It's a question of good governance." Complaining that there had been no Palestinian elections for more than fifteen years, she vowed, "I won't be part of it anymore". The Palestinian Authority was a morally bankrupt tyranny, but at the time she spoke passionately of its sincere desire to advance peace, as opposed to Israel, represented by me, which obstructed peace.
  • Bibi My Story (2022), p. 205
  • Writing the book consumed me. On a good day, writing forces you to distill ideas, to order them logically and to breathe life into them with unexpected language. For me there is no more satisfying intellectual exercise.
    • Bibi My Story (2022), p. 232
  • Clinton warned me to continue on two political tracks, the Palestinian and the Syrian one, and to make far-reaching concessions in both…
The inability of America's diplomats to see this simple truth, remains astonishing. But to face it they would have to chuck the sacred "territory for peace" equation.
That formula could work with Egypt because President Anwar Sadat didn't seek our destruction, but it could'nt work with the Palestinians because they did. That the Palestinians were able to pull the wool so easily over the eyes of American officials was no small achievement for Palestinian spokespersons like Hanan Ashrawi and Saeb Erekat.
  • Bibi My Story (2022), p. 256-257

2023

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  • Israel is at war. We didn’t want this war. It was forced upon us in the most brutal and savage way. But though Israel didn’t start this war, Israel will finish it.
[Hamas has] made a mistake of historic proportions. We will exact a price that will be remembered by them and Israel’s other enemies for decades to come.

2024

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  • I am dealing with stopping the destruction of this country' and that 'Iran is planning our annihilation, Hezbollah is planning our annihilation, they’re in a ring around us and we’re saying we won’t go like sheep to the slaughter
Address to United Nations General Assembly (September 27, 2024)
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  • I didn’t intend to come here this year. My country is at war, fighting for its life. But after I heard the lies and slanders leveled at my country by many of the speakers at this podium, I decided to come here and set the record straight. I decided to come here to speak for my people. To speak for my country, to speak for the truth. And here’s the truth: Israel seeks peace. Israel yearns for peace. Israel has made peace and will make peace again. Yet we face savage enemies who seek our annihilation, and we must defend ourselves against them.
  • Hamas kidnapped 251 people from dozens of different countries, dragging them into the dungeons of Gaza. Israel has brought home 154 of these hostages, including 117 who returned alive. I want to assure you, we will not rest until the remaining hostages are brought home too, and some of their family members are here with us today.
  • Far from being lambs led to the slaughter, Israel’s soldiers have fought back with incredible courage and with heroic sacrifice. And I have another message for this assembly and for the world outside this hall: We are winning.
  • In this body and the Security Council, we’re going to have a deliberation in a few months. And I call on the Security Council to snap back UN Security Council sanctions against Iran because we must all do everything in our power to ensure that Iran never gets nuclear weapons. For decades, I’ve been warning the world against Iran’s nuclear program. Our actions delayed this program by perhaps a decade, but we haven’t stopped it. We’ve delayed it, but we haven’t stopped it. Iran now seeks to weaponize its nuclear program. For the sake of the peace and security of all your countries. For the sake of the peace and security of the entire world, we must not let that happen. And I assure you, Israel will do everything in its power to make sure it doesn’t happen.
  • Just imagine, for those who say Hamas has to stay, it has to be part of a post-war Gaza—imagine, in a post-war situation after World War II, allowing the defeated Nazis in 1945 to rebuild Germany? It’s inconceivable. It’s ridiculous. It didn’t happen then, and it’s not going to happen now. This is why Israel will reject any role for Hamas in a post-war Gaza. We don’t seek to resettle Gaza. What we seek is a demilitarized and de-radicalized Gaza. Only then can we ensure that this round of fighting will be the last round of fighting.
  • In this battle between good and evil, there must be no equivocation. When you stand with Israel, you stand for your own values and your own interests. Yes, we’re defending ourselves, but we’re also defending you against a common enemy that, through violence and terror, seeks to destroy our way of life. So there should be no confusion about this, but unfortunately, there is a lot of it in many countries and in this very hall, as I’ve just heard.
  • We see yet another profound moral confusion when self-described progressives march against the democracy of Israel. Don’t they realize they support the Iranian-backed goons in Tehran and in Gaza, the goons who shot down protesters, murder women for not covering their hair, and hang gays in public squares? Some progressives. According to the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, Iran funds and fuels many of the protesters against Israel. Who knows, maybe some of the protesters or even many of the protesters outside this building now?
  • Ladies and gentlemen, the real war criminals are not in Israel. They’re in Iran. They’re in Gaza, in Syria, in Lebanon, in Yemen. Those of you who stand with these war criminals, those of you who stand with evil against good, with the curse against the blessing, those of you who do so should be ashamed of yourselves. But I have a message for you: Israel will win this battle. We will win this battle because we don’t have a choice.

Quotes about Netanyahu

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In alphabetical order by author or source within the time periods.

through 2008

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  • Who the fuck does he think he is? Who's the fucking superpower here?
    • US President Bill Clinton in 1996, after being lectured by Netanyahu on the Middle East [17]
  • He did superbly, He was very bright. Organized. Strong. Powerful. He knew what he wanted to do and how to get it done. He's not the flippant, superficial person I keep reading about in the newspapers. He was organized and committed.
    • Professor Leon B. Groisser, who mentored Netanyahu as a student at MIT.[1]
  • The fact is he's working against the principles of the Likud. He has no principles at all. I don't see any principles.

2009–2021

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  • There’s a war criminal coming to this country. ... The occupation and expansion … building of settlements, of occupied territory, this is according to the Rome Statute, which is… the setup… the statute on which the international criminal court is based, in so many words, a war crime. ... So why should we receive someone who continues with such things, we could have sent him right away to the international criminal court, that would have been better
  • Netanyahu has become a character witness for right-wingers accused of anti-Semitism. When asked at a press conference in February why he hadn’t been more vocal in condemning anti-Semitic attacks, Trump responded, “You heard Netanyahu yesterday….he said, forget it.” After Glenn Beck repeatedly called Soros a “puppet master,” In 2010, Netanyahu defended Beck for his “courage and integrity” in “defending Israel against the slanders that are hurled against it”...This isn’t surprising. In Netanyahu, men like Orban and Trump see a leader who builds border walls, disdains international institutions and takes a hard line against Muslims. They see the very nationalism that they think liberal Diaspora Jews like Soros lack. And Netanyahu returns the admiration because he’s pursuing the same authoritarian agenda in Israel that they are pursuing in Europe and the United States. Netanyahu, like Orban, has pushed legislation to cripple NGOs that criticize his government. Netanyahu’s government, like Orban’s, has tried to limit academic freedom. And the more Orban and Trump undermine the European Union and the United Nations, the happier Netanyahu will be. Because those institutions champion international law, which Israel massively violates by holding millions of Palestinians as stateless non-citizens, without free movement, due process or the right to vote, in the West Bank.
  • The Israelis always wanted two things that once it turned out they had, it didn't seem so appealing to Mr. Netanyahu. … The real cynics believe that the Netanyahu's government's continued call for negotiations over borders and such means that he's just not going to give up the West Bank.
    • Former US President Bill Clinton describing why he believes Netanyahu is to blame for failure of peace process, Clinton Global Initiative, New York, September 22, 2011 [19]
  • A law-abiding state? Laws can be broken, bent or ridiculed. Dozens of laws which were subject the daunting legislation process under the previous government – his government! – met their early demise in the passed year, just because they were passed by parties who were later exiled to the opposition. ... Concurrently, he initiates, or enables, various wacos in his party to initiate laws which are of clear and immediate threat, amongst them laws that put to ridicule the very foundations of democracy, laws that undermine the principles of social equality, laws which bruise Israel's reputation, laws that make a mockery of war against corruption, laws that destroy secular education. And the list goes on. ... The Messiah King Netanyahu, in his view, can't make do with a mere fence protecting us against the deadly animals of the Middle East in order to salvage the State of Israel. The prime minister wishes to weaken the political system, and while doing so, dwarf his ministers as well. On the second tier, he is trying to undermine trust in holders of public positions and eliminate their ability to stand in his way. On the third tier he is doing all he can, literally all he can, to kill the free press. ... It has not been worded by a Leftist from the state of Tel Aviv, but by right wing folk who are closely acquainted with the prime minister. They speak of him in awe, some even admire him, and they undoubtedly support his political views and his macro-economical perceptions. But, none the less, Netanyahu's "big plan" – to destroy democracy in order to save the state – scares them. They shared their fears with the writer of this column, out of true and utter anxiety.
  • How dare you! You are the one who disappointed us. You haven't made a single step to advance peace.
    • German Chancellor Angela Merkel during a telephone conversation with Benjamin Netanyahu on Feb 25, 2011 [20]
  • Everything that Netanyahu is indicted for, involved when he is being prime minister that he violated the authority of prime minister in order to benefit himself, to benefit his friends, for his own personal interests, this is a fundamental defect... while I decided that I resigned at the very early stage because I felt that it will not be appropriated for prime minister to get into direct confrontation with law enforcement of the country. No one is above the law, I suffered from this, but I bowed my head and I said, the courts are above me...Netanyahu thinks he is not only above the courts but he's also above the country, this one would not work...
  • What I fear is going on in the House now is an effort to target Congresswoman Omar as a way of stifling that debate. That’s wrong
    Anti-Semitism is a hateful and dangerous ideology which must be vigorously opposed in the United States and around the world
    We must not, however, equate anti-Semitism with legitimate criticism of the right-wing, Netanyahu government in Israel.
  • Nicolas Sarkozy: I cannot bear Netanyahu, he's a liar
  • Barack Obama: You're fed up with him, but I have to deal with him even more often than you.
    • Private conversation between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and American President Barack Obama at the November 4, 2011 G20 Summit. The conversation was accidentally recorded by mic's placed for translators [21]
  • It is not American Jews who have betrayed their Israeli cousins. It is the Netanyahu-led Israeli government that has betrayed Jews outside Israel, by aligning itself with nationalist parties in countries like Poland and Hungary, who are hostile to the ideals that make it possible for Jews in the diaspora to live free of persecution.
    • Adam Serwer "The Jewish Divide" in The Cruelty Is the Point: The Past, Present, and Future of Trump's America (2021)
  • The public must recognize this simple equation: The continued rule of Netanyahu, as well as of any right-wing coalition that opposes a diplomatic solution and a dividing of the land, means the continued flourishing of a Hamas government and further routine, lethal rocket fire against Israel. Bibi needs a strong Hamas; this should be the new slogan of Netanyahu’s opponents.
  • In the 1980s when you [Netanyahu] were Israel's representative to the United Nations, I once sat at your New York dinner table, and you were a conversational bully to your guests then, just as you are a bully to these two elected women leaders [Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar] now.
    • Gloria Steinem, an excerpt from an open letter to Netanyahu after he decided to bar the entry of U.S. Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar to Israel (17 August 2019)[2]
  • Israel targeting media sources is so the world can't see Israel's war crimes led by the apartheid-in-chief Netanyahu. It's so the world can't see the killing of babies, children and their parents. It's so the world can't see Palestinians being massacred.
  • I spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. I told Bibi, you know we give Israel 4.5 billion dollars a year. And they are doing very well at defending themselves
    I’m the one that moved the embassy to Jerusalem. I was the one who was willing to do that. So that’s the way it is - we are going to take great care of Israel. Israel is going to be good. We give Israel 4.5 billion a year. And we give frankly a lot more than that if you look at the books. They’ve been doing a good job
  • The current prime-minister spoke at and attended rallies in which Yitzhak Rabin was compared to a Nazi, and crowds were calling for his death. He represents a malignant force in Israeli society and the whole body politic of the Jewish people. This man is allowed to speak at The Jewish Federations of North America. He’s allowed to speak anywhere he wants in the Jewish community throughout the world. I think he should be shunned completely. There is no shortage of rage. There’s not much of an inclination to compromise, or moderate one’s feelings, when this person claims to be the representative of the Jewish people.
  • I call Trump Netanyahu with smaller hands in the introduction. Netanyahu shares a lot in common with Trump. Including demagoguery, bigotry, attacks on the press, attacks on institutions of democracy, attacks on human rights organizations. I don’t know if Trump has gone that far yet, but he will. It’s a similar method of autocrats. It was inconceivable to me for the past ten years that anyone in a Jewish communal organization or institution would allow Netanyahu into its doors, because he’s the kind of thing that we have feared. And yet, he’s the head of the Jewish state.

2023

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  • The US is putting enormous pressure on PM, Netanyahu, to abandon the Judicial ‘Reform’, which however constitutes the key-stone undergirding the whole ‘Land of Israel’ edifice: A project that is predicated upon ‘re-taking’ all of the West Bank from Palestinian ‘hands’. An enterprise that has the potential to shake the region to its very core -- and to trigger war.
  • The disaster that befell Israel on the holiday of Simchat Torah is the clear responsibility of one person: Benjamin Netanyahu. The prime minister, who has prided himself on his vast political experience and irreplaceable wisdom in security matters, completely failed to identify the dangers he was consciously leading Israel into when establishing a government of annexation and dispossession.
  • [T]he military and intelligence failure does not absolve Netanyahu of his overall responsibility for the crisis, as he is the ultimate arbiter of Israeli foreign and security affairs.
  • I think that the government... is going to pay a hell of a price, and it will — must go home. I don’t see the situation in which Netanyahu continues, and all the ministers around him, who are, all of them, no ones, fascists, and they, part of them, would even be defined in Europe as neo-Nazis, those people who called for all kind of terrible things to do and did nothing to make Israel prepared for any danger, and continue now to doing nothing. That’s so astonishing that we are now the fifth day after the war, and you don’t see the government. They are still preoccupied with their own political careers, with all kind of political manipulations. Nobody takes care of the situation.
    Israel is really falling apart, from this point of view. And the man who governed Israel for the last 15 years is the one, and the only one, to be blamed, before anyone else. This goes without saying. And I guess at six after the war, as we say, million Israelis will go to the streets, and they will have only one demand: At least, Netanyahu, go home. If not, Netanyahu, go to court and be sentenced for this irresponsible policy that you have been committing.
  • This vicious circle will not be solved by power, not be solved by tanks, and not will be — nor will it be solved by troops, only by political agreement and, above all and first of all, lifting this criminal siege, for God’s sake, after 17 years.... Netanyahu is busy with politics. And here comes this Biden and tells Israel what Israel wanted to hear. I would love him also to say some things about the Palestinian suffering, the Palestinian agony. He ignored it totally, and this is very regretful. But by the end of the day, this is what Israel needs now: some kind of leadership. And it totally lacks it. Nobody is around, really, to understand that we have to go for a new way. Nobody is there.
  • Two things have changed since Obama's failed attempt to revive peace talks. First, Netanyahu has alienated the large majority of Jewish Americans. The days when Israel could rely on automatic Jewish-American support have gone. For this, the Israeli prime minister is almost single-handedly responsible. In 2015 he broke all protocol when he opposed Obama's signature Iran nuclear deal in a speech to Congress. Since most Jewish Americans are Democratic, and since the US right has increasingly flirted with antisemitic tropes, this was a reckless gamble. Supporting Netanyahu’s Israel became a Republican thing.
    Second, Israel has the most hard-right government in the democratic world. Netanyahu has borrowed antisemitic imagery about George Soros from the likes of Trump and Hungary's Viktor Orbán. His logic is that Jews can only be safe in Israel, which gives him a warped affinity for nativist groups across the west. To most non-Israeli Jews, and roughly half of Israel, Netanyahu’s ideological bedfellows are repugnant. Yet he is the most moderate member of the government he leads.
  • Yesterday, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the war on Hamas his nation's second independence war and warned that it would be long. Meanwhile, the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross has called the humanitarian situation in Gaza a, quote, "catastrophic failing that the world must not tolerate.

2024

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  • The people who are running the show for some time -- which is how we arrived at this disastrous destination -- are these absolutist actors who, they might say "We'll negotiate and here's a condition and here's, y'know, whatever." They might say that to some people, but in practice, we see from, y'know, many years of Netenyahu governance, every single document and statement as you showed of people from Hamas, these are people who want everything, right? They see half of the people on the land as the problem.
  • Had [Israel] followed Biden’s advice, they would be waiting for a bomb to drop onto them. But fortunately, you know, Bibi [Netanyahu] calls me quite a bit, and we have a lot of talks. But I always say, ‘Make up your own mind.’ But Bibi has his own opinions.
  • The value that even Netanyahu would see in it is the consolidation between the evangelical bases of the Republican Party and the state of Israel during a very, very difficult period where Israel is getting a lot of pushback from Jewish Americans who are offended by what's happening in Gaza and beyond.

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  1. ↑ http://news.mit.edu/1996/netanyahu-0605
  2. ↑ https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/ny-gloria-steinem-slams-benyamin-netanyahu-20190818-r664wekhlfautfhsnzj254bj5a-story.html
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