Benny Morris Quotes

Prominent Israeli Historian

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12 Quotes by Benny Morris

1. A hundred or so years of conflict with Arab nations and of terrorism, culminating in the Hamas brutality of Oct. 7, have demonstrated that Israel, certainly for the moment, can be considered the least safe place on earth for Jews.

2. Benjamin Netanyahu ... is right that it’s crucial for Israel to conquer Rafah and destroy the Hamas battalions ensconced in that city at the southern end of the Gaza Strip, protected by a human shield of some 1.4 million residents and refugees from the north.

3. I would rather be a racist than a bore.

4. If the War of Independence had ended with an absolute separation of populations – the Palestinian Arabs on the east side of the Jordan River and the Jews on the west side – the Middle East would be less volatile and both peoples would have suffered less over the past 70 years. They would have been satisfied with a state of their own, not exactly what they wanted, and we would have received the whole Land of Israel.

5. Even if territorial compromise with the Palestinians is not realistic in this generation, as was also the case earlier, you have to play the diplomatic game – even if you know it won’t lead anywhere – in order to retain the West’s sympathy. You have to look like you’re pursuing peace, even if you’re not.

6. Realistic leaders in Washington and Jerusalem cannot allow Tehran to have the Bomb. And, in the coming months or year, must do what is necessary to halt and destroy the Iranian nuclear project. And if this involves a protracted, conventional air assault on the Iranian nuclear facilities—then so be it. The Iranians will have brought that assault on their own heads. And, if conventional weapons cannot do the job—and if Israel is forced to go the course alone, it is doubtful that its conventional capabilities will be sufficient to destroy the Iranian nuclear project. Then non-conventional weaponry will have to be used to stymie the project. And many innocent Iranians will die. But the Iranians will have brought this upon themselves by bringing to power and leaving in power a leadership that will have forced Israelis to do what was necessary in order to survive.

7. [In] certain conditions, expulsion is not a war crime. I don't think that the expulsions of 1948 were war crimes. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. You have to dirty your hands.

8. You have to put things in proportion. These are small war crimes.

9. Something like a cage has to be built for them [Palestinians]. I know that sounds terrible. It is really cruel. But there is no choice. There is a wild animal there that has to be locked up in one way or another.

10. The barbarians who want to take our lives [are like serial killers]. The people the Palestinian society sends to carry out the terrorist attacks, and in some way the Palestinian society itself as well. At the moment, that society is in the state of being a serial killer. It is a very sick society. It should be treated the way we treat individuals who are serial killers.

11. If [David Ben-Gurion] was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job. I know that this stuns the Arabs and the liberals and the politically correct types. But my feeling is that this place would be quieter and know less suffering if the matter had been resolved once and for all. If Ben-Gurion had carried out a large expulsion and cleansed the whole country – the whole Land of Israel, as far as the Jordan River. It may yet turn out that this was his fatal mistake. If he had carried out a full expulsion – rather than a partial one – he would have stabilized the State of Israel for generations.

12. [I]f an Arab murders an Arab in an Arab village, they automatically blame the police for not patrolling enough, but they will not blame themselves and say that Arabs murder Arabs because it seems quite natural there… In the Arab world – and the Israeli Arabs are part of it – you find a lack of self-criticism. It’s always the stranger who’s to blame. The Briton, the American, the Russian, the Jew, the Israeli – someone else is to blame for your troubles. They breed much more crime, in comparison to Jewish society. If you were to tell me that they are poorer and therefore they have more property crimes and theft, I would say: That’s right, poor societies breed material crime. But we’re talking about murder in far larger numbers. It’s not a matter of money. It’s the society’s nature.