Mohammad Reza I of Iran Quotes

We may be delighted to see Israel putting the Arabs in their place, but we have repeatedly condemned their occupation of Arab territory.

How can you hope to build up a nation by fragmenting its politics into opposing camps? Whatever one group builds, the other will endeavour to destroy.

A crown, a throne could not be based on the not too very solid foundation of blood.

What do these feminists want? What do you want? You say equality. Oh! I don't want to seem rude, but ...you're equal in the eyes of the law but not, excuse my saying so, in ability.

Do you remember the afternoon, at one of our first meetings, when we'd been playing quoits? There were a lot of us, quite a crowd. Most of the quoits fell on the ground instead of the target, and you were kind enough to run and pick them up for everyone. You had already charmed me, but on that day I loved the way you were so natural.

We were wrong to believe that the British are our friends. You are obsessed solely with yout own selfish interests and treat us as a people beyond the pale. But your attitude is a matter of profound disinterest. Your democratic system has already erupted into chaos. We shall soon overtake you and in a decade you will be struggling in our wake. Perhaps then you will remember how you treated us.

... the Saudis have never shown any respect for human rights, either now or in the past. Even a petty burglar faces having one of his hands chopped off. The liberal press in America prefers to ignore all this, although they don't hesitate to blacken the reputation of Iran.

To be first in the Middle East is not enough. We must raise ourselves to the level of a great world power.

Who on earth do the Americans suppose their allies are amongst the Arab world? Even Saudi Arabia they seem to regard as nothing more than a reservoir of oil and money.

I am convinced that the majority of the religious hierarchy today deplores the hardship inflicted on our people. I am referring not only to the martyrs but of the families who have been dispersed and terrified, who have no resources, and to the four million unemployed who are suffering from the economic chaos of a country which only a year earlier was giving employment to a million foreigners. Those who have chosen to serve God must feel profoundly sad at seeing ridicule poured on the most sacred principles of our religion.

Pride comes before a fall- although in [Henry Kissinger's] case it's more conceit than pride.

Who are they to try me? They should be tried first. [They are] people who are rejecting the United Nations resolutions, who are rejecting the Hague Court resolution, who are rejecting the world public opinion, who have no respect for any internation law, and who are massacring people, executing people, just imprisoning thousands and thousands and thousands without any reasons. Who is going to try them?

They want liberalization! I'll give them liberalization. I'll loosen the screws until the Americans beg me to tighten them again.

I am not bloodthirsty. I am working for my country and the coming generations. I can't waste my time on a few young idiots. I don't believe the tortures attributed to the SAVAK are as common as people say, but I can't run everything. Besides, we have ways of using psychological pressure that are much more effective than torture... My people have every kind of freedom, except the freedom to betray.

I wish to salute the intransigent patriotism and the unflinching determination for independence of the Roumanian president. I was allied to him by a true friendship.