I am very grateful for the opportunities I have been afforded.

Better a broken heart than a hardened one.

Everything I have experienced in my life helps form who I am today, and I would not change or forget any of it.

How women view religion's role in society is shaped more by their own country's culture and context than one monolithic view that religion is simply bad for women.

While economic development [in Egypt] made a few people rich, it left many more worse off. As people felt less and less free, they also felt less and less provided for.

They're still out there talking about gun control measures, as if somehow terrorists care about what our gun laws are.

If no one can do that, yeah, Donald Trump better man the lifeboats, because there's some significant chance he'll win the nomination.

Human development, not secularization, is what's key to women's empowerment in the transforming Middle East.

I'm hearing here that this Muslim movement, well, for women, is what we have to focus on. And women have been doing, I think, the right thing. Having the conversations, talking to people about that.

I think the blood is spilling in Syria and it's mostly Muslims.

I'm not in the business of changing policies. I hope to inform, not form, decisions.

You're either reading a book or you're not.

Sweetheart, my heart is your home, you can always stay there.

surround yourself with people who allow you to be yourself, it does not mean be around others who do not have a sense of right or wrong, who lack respect, love and compassion for others.

If you have a bald head don't walk out in the sun because you will get burned.

The job of the novelist is to invent: to embroider, to color, to embellish, to entertain, to make things up. The art of what I do lies not in research or even recollection but primarily in invention.

For to see good put in action is what everybody needs.

If you're having trouble succeeding, fail.

Polish the heart, free the six senses and let them function without obstruction, and your entire body will glow.

Very interesting for an old duffer like me to try his hand at something new. If I don't do that once in a while, I might just turn into a fossil, you know!

Laughing has always seemed to me to be more Jewish than praying.