I was proud my father spoke Arabic fluently - his father sent him to learn Arabic from a sheikh - and we had Arab friends. His task of understanding the Arabs - not only politics but poetry - was very important; he took it as a vocation.

I deeply respect literature and expect to gain insight from a book and to identify emotionally with its characters. I therefore avoid reading suspense novels or science fiction.

One of the dreams of Zionism was to be a bridge. Instead, we are creating exclusion between the East and the West instead of creating bridges; we are contributing to the conflict between East and West by our stupid desire to have more.

So with truth - there is a certain moment when one can say, this is the truth and here I put a dot, a stop, and I go to another thing. A judge has to put an end to a deliberation. But for a historian, there's never an end to the past. It can go on and on and on.

Let's face it: grandparents are very important to family systems. You're babysitters, but you also instill values in children that sometimes skip a generation.

I don't want kids listening to my music thinking it's for their parents. I want them to feel it's theirs.

I grew up in East Berlin, in a family of artists.

I spend a part of the year in New York when based in L.A. and vice versa. It's the only way I feel balanced. Outside of theater and my community of friends out there, my family is still in N.Y., so I have a lot of reasons to spend time out there as well. I guess I'm bi-coastal.