Yair Lapid Quotes

I cannot conceive of Israel withdrawing if Arab states do not recognize Israel, within secure borders.

The U.S. should support the historic Gaza withdrawal as a first step toward a final settlement: a permanent Palestinian state in Gaza and nearly all of the West Bank.

I think that peace will require two states, a Palestinian state that recognizes the Jewish state.

I believe the Palestinians have never indicated a willingness to meet our minimum requirements, which are recognition of Israel's permanence and legitimacy as a Jewish state and end of claims and end of conflict.

There cannot be peace in the Middle East without giving Palestinians their full rights.

The Palestinians want a state, but they have to give peace in return. What they're trying to do in the United Nations is to get a state without giving Israel peace or giving Israel peace and security. And I think that's, that's wrong. That should not succeed. That should, that should fail.

We expect President Bush to implement his own vision of a two-state solution, the birth of the Palestinian State and the ending of the occupation that started in 1967.

There is no way Israel will deal with the Palestinians if the Palestinians do not understand the suffering of the Jewish people.

The real reason we haven't had peace is because of a persistent refusal of the Palestinians to recognize a Jewish state in any border.

It simply cannot be disputed that for decades the Palestinian leadership was more interested in there not being a Jewish state than in there being a Palestinian state.

We need to see a Palestinian state.

Israel was seen as having demonstrated unmistakably it wanted peace, and the reason it wasn't available, achievable was because Arafat wouldn't accept it.

I believe that if Israel were to put an end to the settlements in the West Bank tomorrow, as it did in Gaza, there would still be reluctance on the part of the Palestinian Authority to recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish secular democracy.

Here, I declare that the Palestine Liberation Organization is ready to return immediately to the negotiating table on the basis of the adopted terms of reference based on international legitimacy and a complete cessation of settlement activities.

What Israel wants is peace with - and the acknowledgment of - all the Arab countries.

We want the Israelis to leave. They want to leave - so let us let them leave.

Most of the approaches to peace between Israel and the Palestinians, have been directed at trying to resolve the most complex problems, like refugees and Jerusalem, which is akin to building the pyramid from the top down.

If Hamas wants to be part of the real world, it has to end up accepting Israel's right to exist.

I believe that in the long run, separation between Israel and the Palestinians is the best solution for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

A precondition for any solution to the Arab Israeli problem must be a recognition on the part of all parties on the legitimacy of all parties. That is, you cannot build a political agreement on the premise that a Jewish state in Palestine is illegitimate.

I think history will judge him very harshly for not having seized the opportunity in the year 2000 to embrace the offer that was very courageously made by the then Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Barack, which involved the Israelis agreeing to 90 per cent of what the Palestinians had wanted.

The United States cannot want peace more than the Palestinians and the Israelis.

There are many Palestinians who believe there is no way to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. They call for the right of the return of refugees to Israel - something which is unacceptable for the consensus in Israel and which strikes at the very heart of this issue.

Palestine is the issue, and until this issue is resolved, there can be no peace.

Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist.