Peter Hitchens Quotes

Historical hypocrites have themselves carried out the very human rights abuses that they suddenly decide warrant intervention elsewhere.

That's always the way with fanatics; they cross themselves at the tavern and throw stones at the temple.

We should never say that we recognize the right of these mullahs to oppress their own people.

Americans want to democratise us. OK, but why not go and democratise Saudi Arabia. Are we anything like Saudi Arabia? No, we are far from that. So why aren't they democratising Saudi Arabia? Because they are bastards, but they are their bastards.

I'm amazed at the adolescent nature of some of the religious fanatics in our government. And they're full of double standards.

All nations are more tolerant of their own mistakes and weaknesses than of the mistakes and weaknesses of others.

I was an opponent of Saddam Hussein when the British and American governments and businessmen were selling him guns and gas.

Few governments in the world, for example, praise human rights more ardently than does the government of France, and few have a worse record of supporting tyrants and killers.

We all decry prejudice, yet are all prejudiced.

Egypt, once a melting pot of peoples, classes, cultures and religions, has, after 30 years of Mubarak's rule, become a place of intolerance and distrust of the other.

It's not a democracy here, it's the Middle East.

Prostitution, although hounded, imprisoned, and chained, is nevertheless the greatest triumph of Puritanism.

I hate Iran. I hate the Iranian government. It's a cruel and evil government.

In effect, Saudi Arabia legitimizes fundamentalism, religious discrimination, intolerance and the oppression of women. Saudi women not only can't drive, but are also told by some clerics that they mustn't wear seatbelts for fear of showing the outlines of their bodies.

My judges preach against free love openly, practice it secretly.

Hamas is a political-religious movement systematically throwing shackles on the mind.

When a dictatorship controls the political life of a country, responsible opposition cannot develop, and dissent is driven underground and toward the extreme. And to draw attention away from their social and economic failures, dictators place blame on other countries and other races, and stir the hatred that leads to violence. This status quo of despotism and anger cannot be ignored or appeased, kept in a box or bought off.

Puritans should wear fig leaves on their eyes.

There are men—now in power in this country—who do not respect dissent, who cannot cope with turmoil, and who believe that the people of America are ready to support repression so long as it is done with a quiet voice and a business suit.

The real problem is that Saudi Arabia is bogged down by deep-rooted Islamic extremism in most schools and mosques, which have become breeding grounds for terrorists. We cannot solve the terrorism problem as long as it is endemic to our educational and religious institutions. .

The history of the opium fight forms a queer illustration of our National blindness to our own faults, and emphasizes our National tendency to see with amazing clarity, the sins of others, while remaining blind to our own viciousness

Men condemne the same things in others, which they approve in themselves; on the other side, they publickly commend what they privately condemne;

It is forbidden to work as a teacher under the current puppet regime, because this strengthens the system of the infidels …. If a teacher refuses a warning to give up his job, he must be beaten…. If the teacher still continues to instruct contrary to the principles of Islam, the district commander or a group leader must kill him.

There is a terrible price the U. S. Government must pay when it associates itself … intimately with a repressive regime.

He [Rafael Trujillo] had his torture chambers. He had his political assassinations. But he kept law and order, cleaned the place up, made it sanitary, built public works, and he didn’t bother the United States. So that was fine with us.