Video: Secretary Clinton's Remarks With Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak

Remarks With Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak After Their Meeting

Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of State
Treaty Room
Washington, DC
April 27, 2010

SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I am delighted once again to welcome my friend back to the State Department. I have known the defense minister for more years than I care to remember. We were both very young, Ehud.

DEFENSE MINISTER BARAK: Immediately after your birth. (Laughter.)

SECRETARY CLINTON: And we had an excellent, very constructive, positive conversation. And he is now off to see the Secretary of Defense later today after having seen both General Jones and President Obama yesterday. So again, I welcome you here to the State Department.

DEFENSE MINISTER BARAK: Thank you, Madam Secretary, for your commitment both to the friendship and the responsibility of American policy in the Middle East and for your consistent support of the security and well-being of Israel, and for your open eyes to support the work to be done in the Middle East and all over the globe to push us all together or move together toward this peace. Thank you very much.

SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you all very much. Thank you all.

QUESTION: Mr. Defense Minister, are you confident that --

SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you all.

DEFENSE MINISTER BARAK: We follow the orders from the (inaudible). (Laughter.)

SECRETARY CLINTON: This time it’s --

DEFENSE MINISTER BARAK: I come highly regarded. (Laughter.)

SECRETARY CLINTON: It’s the reporters at the Defense Department that get to ask a question. (Laughter.)