Pastoral Resources

I defend Israel's right to exist, to defend themselves, to not let themselves be exterminated a second time.

I believe that the people of Israel are the chosen people of God.

If you live in Israel and you see the way life is there and then you go abroad and see the way Israel is reported on, the way that Israel gets reported on night after night is simply pictures of bombings or military actions.

Many of the Europeans who want Israel to go away don't even know why they do. Nearly a third of those interviewed concede they have no idea what the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is all about. It's enough to know that Israelis are Jews.

You still can't find Israel on a map of the Middle East in a Palestinian schoolbook.

My commitment to the security and future of Israel is based upon basic morality as well as enlightened self-interest. Our role in supporting Israel honors our own heritage.

In fact, the Iraqi foreign minister admitted in March 2003 that Iraqi funds were sent to families of Palestinian suicide bombers who attacked and killed innocent Israeli citizens, and also 12 Americans in Israel in 2003.

Hitler had this deal where he was supposed to make it rough on them so they would all get out and migrate to Israel because they needed people there to fight the Arabs.

In Israel, in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.

Israel has created a new image of the Jew in the world - the image of a working and an intellectual people, of a people that can fight with heroism.

Building walls isn't going to work in the long run. Some people are happy with the wall in Israel, but somebody will get a weapon someday and knock it over or something. Walls aren't the answer between countries, though.

Osama bin Laden, the person, more likely serves the function of a stand-in. Compare the new terrorists with partisans or conventional terrorists in Israel. These people often fight in a decentralized manner in small, autonomous units, too.

President George W. Bush is the first American president to call openly for two-states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security.

We want to see Israel withdraw from our territory. But we don't want to be accountable vis-a-vis Israel on the security basis, because we don't see, in the absence of a peace agreement, that Lebanon can really be accountable to Israel if anything happens.

On the other hand, we have in Israel, an Israeli government which has been elected by the Israeli people. Their political agenda is not for peace. They are from the camp anti-peace.

At the same time as we clearly condemn actions of violence by groups in Palestinian against Israel.

The actions of the terrorist organizations, Hezbollah, in Lebanon, and Hamas, in Gaza, against Israel are unconscionable. Instead of working towards peace, these terrorist organizations have chosen to perpetuate the violence.

Unprovoked attacks on Israel's borders, murdering Israeli soldiers, taking Israeli hostages and showering rockets targeting and killing Israeli civilians are not furthering any legitimate goal.

And if we are honest we have to make a distinction between a democratic Israel that wants to live in peace and the terrorists who want Israel wiped out. The Israelis were told to give up land for peace; they gave up the land, but got no peace.

The only thing chicken about Israel is their soup.