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1 " Don't be so humble - you are not that great. "
― Golda Meir
2 " Let me tell you the one thing I have against Moses. He took us forty years into the desert in order to bring us to the one place in the Middle East that has no oil! "
3 " One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present. "
― Golda Meir , My Life
4 " Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. "
5 " 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. "
6 " Those who do not know how to weep with their whole heart don't know how to laugh either "
7 " 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! "
8 " There is no Zionism except the rescue of Jews. "
9 " You'll never find a better sparring partner than adversity. "
10 " I must govern the clock, not be governed by it. "
11 " A leader who doesn't hesitate before he sends his nation into battle is not fit to be a leader. "
12 " The dog that trots about finds a bone. "
13 " I can honestly say that I was never affected by the question of the success of an undertaking. If I felt it was the right thing to do, I was for it regardless of the possible outcome. "
14 " Old age is like a plane flying through a storm. Once you're aboard there's nothing you can do. "
― Golda Meir , As good as Golda;: The warmth and wisdom of Israel's Prime Minister
15 " Let me at this juncture deal also with the ridiculous accusation that I have heard for so many years to the effect that we ignored the Arabs of Palestine and set about developing the country as though it had no Arab population at all. When the instigators of the Arab disturbances of the late 1930s claimed, as they did, that the Arabs were attacking us because they had been ‘dispossessed’, I did not have to look up British census figures to know that the Arab population of Palestine had doubled since the start of the Jewish settlement there. I had seen for myself the rate of growth of the Arab population ever since I had first come to Palestine. Not only did the living standard of the Arabs of Palestine far exceed that of Arabs anywhere else in the Middle East, but, attracted by the new opportunities, hordes of Arabs were immigrating to Palestine from Syria and other neighboring countries all through those years. Whenever some kindly representative of the British government sought to shut off Jewish immigration by declaring that there was not enough room in Palestine, I remember making speeches about Palestine’s larger absorptive capacity, complete with statistical references which I dutifully took from British sources, but which were based on what I had actually witnessed with my own eyes.And let me add, there was no time during the thirties that I did not hope that eventually the Arabs of Palestine would live with us in peace and equally as citizens of a Jewish homeland – just as I kept on hoping that Jews who live in Arab countries would be allowed to live there in peace and equality. "
16 " The British went on fighting like lions against the Germans, the Italians, and the Japanese, but they couldn’t or wouldn’t stand up to the Arabs at all – though much of the Arab world was openly pro-Nazi. "
17 " When peace comes we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons. Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us. "
― Golda Meir , A Land of Our Own: An Oral Autobiography
18 " It is true we have won all our wars, but we have paid for them. "
19 " It has never ceased to astonish me that the Arab states have been so eager to go to war against us. Almost from the very beginning of Zionist settlement until today, they have been consumed by hatred for us. "
20 " 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. "
