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The state of Israel seems to owe its very existence to the American Jewish vote, while at the same time consigning the non-religious to political oblivion.

There is no question that Israelis - indeed, all concerned Jews - have to continue to work out a Jewish public philosophy that truly justifies a Jewish state in the land of Israel.

The idea that the State of Israel could be democracy only for its Jewish citizens is unconscionable, and we must find a way to address this.

I have reached a conclusion that when we have to make a choice between greater Israel or a Jewish democratic state - and we have to make this choice, it is inevitable - then my choice is a Jewish democratic country.

We want Israel as a democratic and Jewish state. So you have to maintain a Jewish majority, and you want to do that by legal means, by democratic means.

There is a crisis on the Right. It sees the Jewish and democratic state as a democracy for the Jews. This is something I cannot countenance.

The reality is that Israel is a multi-ethnic, multireligious society, and it makes no sense to insist as a precondition for peace that its neighbors recognize it as 'the Jewish state.'

The burden is on the Jewish majority in Israel to prove that the definition of their country as Jewish and democratic is not a contradiction.

Israel fits into the zeitgeist of our era. It is true that there are demographic threats to its existence. That is why a separation from the Palestinians is a compelling imperative.

In Israel, generally speaking, politics is much more familiar than any other place. We all know each other.