Golda Meir Quotes

We do not rejoice in victories. We rejoice when a new kind of cotton is grown and when strawberries bloom in Israel.

One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.

Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement.

We can forgive [the Arabs] for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with [the Arabs] when they love their children more than they hate us...

Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life.

Don't be humble... you're not that great.

You'll never find a better sparring partner than adversity.

The Egyptians could run to Egypt, the Syrians into Syria. The only place we could run was into the sea, and before we did that we might as well fight.

There is no such thing as a Palestinian people... It is not as if we came and threw them out and took their country. They didn't exist.

I must govern the clock, not be governed by it.

Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil!

It isn't really important to decide when you are very young just exactly what you want to become when you grow up. It is much more important to decide on the way you want to live. If you are going to be honest with yourself and honest with your friends, if you are going to get involved in causes which are good for others, not only for yourselves, then it seems to me that that is sufficient, and maybe what you will be is only a matter of chance.

By the way, did you ever realize that if Moses would have turned right instead of left, we'd have had the oil, the Arabs would have had the sand?

Ability hits the mark where presumption overshoots and diffidence falls short.

If we have to have a choice between being dead and pitied, and being alive with a bad image, we'd rather be alive and have the bad image.

Pessimism is a luxury that a Jew can never allow himself.

The world hates a Jew who hits back. The world loves us only when we are to be pitied.

Once in a Cabinet we had to deal with the fact that there had been an outbreak of assaults on women at night. One minister suggested a curfew; women should stay home after dark. I said, 'But it's the men who are attacking the women. If there's to be a curfew, let the men stay home, not the women.

The only way to eliminate war is to love our children more than we hate our enemies.

We Jews have a secret weapon in our struggle with the Arabs; we have no place to go.

This country exists as the fulfillment of a promise made by God Himself. It would be ridiculous to ask it to account for its legitimacy.

Don't become cynical. Don't give up hope. Don't believe that everything is judged only by expediency. There is idealism in this world. There is human brotherhood.

It isnt enough to believe in something; you have to have the stamina to meet obstacles and overcome them, to struggle.

A leader who doesn't hesitate before he sends his nation into battle is not fit to be a leader.

One of the first sights that shocked me, when I came to Israel in 1921, was an Arab turning over a field with a very primitive plow; pulling the plow were an ox and a woman. Now, if it means that we have destroyed this romantic picture by bringing in tractors, combines, and threshing machines, this is true: we have.

It is not only a matter, I believe, of religious observance and practice. To me, being Jewish means and has always meant being proud to be part of a people that has maintained its distinct identity for more than 2,000 years, with all the pain and torment that has been inflicted upon it.

Above all, this country is our own. Nobody has to get up in the morning and worry what his neighbors think of him. Being a Jew is no problem here.

Every civilization finds it necessary to negotiate compromises with its own values.

Those that perished in Hitler's gas chambers were the last Jews to die without standing up to defend themselves.

Those who don't know how to weep with their whole heart, don't know how to laugh either.

There can be no doubt that the average man blames much more than he praises. His instinct is to blame. If he is satisfied he says nothing; if he is not, he most illogically kicks up a row.

There will be peace in the Middle East only when the Arabs love their children more than they hate Israel.

My dear, old age is like an airplane flying in a storm. Once you're in it there's nothing you can do. You can't stop a plane, you can't stop a storm, you can't stop time. So you might as well take it easy, with wisdom.

To be or not to be is not a question of compromise. Either you be or you don't be.

Arab sovereignty in Jerusalem just cannot be. This city will not be divided - not half and half, not 60-40, not 75-25, nothing.

Israel itself is the strongest guarantee against another Holocaust.

A story once went the rounds of Israel to the effect that Ben-Gurion described me as 'the only man' in his cabinet. What amused me about is that he (or whoever invented the story) thought that this was the greatest compliment that could be paid to a woman. I very much doubt that any man would have been flattered if I had said about him that he was the only woman in the government!

I don't know why you use a fancy French word like detente when there's a good English phrase for it - cold war.

You can't improve on saying nothing.

America is a great country. It has many shortcomings, many social inequalities, and it's tragic that the problem of the blacks wasn't solved fifty or even a hundred years ago, but it's still a great country, a country full of opportunities, of freedom! Does it seem nothing to you to be able to say what you like, even against the government, the Establishment?

Glorious bouquets and storms of applause are the trimmings which every artist naturally enjoys.

Any one who speaks in favor of bringing the Arab refugees back must also say how he expects to take the responsibility for it, if he is interested in the state of Israel. It is better that things are stated clearly and plainly: We shall not let this happen.

Men are committing the rapes. Let them be put under curfew.

We don't thrive on military acts. We do them because we have to, and thank God we are efficient.

I want to say to you, friends, that the Jewish community in Palestine is going to fight to the very end. If we have arms to fight with, we will fight with those, and if not, we will fight with stones in our hands.

Not being beautiful was the true blessing. Not being beautiful forced me to develop my inner resources. The pretty girl has a handicap to overcome.

Old age is like a plane flying through a storm. Once you're aboard, there's nothing you can do.

At work, you think of the children you have left at home. At home, you think of the work you've left unfinished. Such a struggle is unleashed within yourself. Your heart is rent.

The only alternative to war is peace and the only road to peace is negotiations.

Anybody who believes in something without reservation believes that this thing is right and should be, has the stamina to meet obstacles and overcome them.