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Shimon Peres

January 26, 2023

Shimon Peres (/ʃiːˌmoʊn ˈpɛrɛs, -ɛz/;[1][2][3] Hebrew: שמעון פרס [ʃiˌmon ˈpeʁes] (listen); born Szymon Perski; 2 August 1923 – 28 September 2016) was an Israeli politician who served as the eighth prime minister of Israel from 1984 to 1986 and from 1995 to 1996 and as the ninth president of Israel from 2007 to 2014. He was a member of twelve cabinets and represented five political parties in a political career spanning 70 years.[4] Peres was elected to the Knesset in November 1959 and except for a three-month-long interregnum in early 2006, served as a member of the Knesset continuously until he was elected president in 2007. Serving in the Knesset for 48 years (with the first uninterrupted stretch lasting more than 46 years), Peres is the longest serving member in the Knesset's history. At the time of his retirement from politics in 2014, he was the world's oldest head of state and was considered the last link to Israel's founding generation.[5]

Shimon Peres
שמעון פרס
Peres in 1996
9th President of Israel
In office
15 July 2007 – 24 July 2014
Prime Minister
Preceded byMoshe Katsav
Succeeded byReuven Rivlin
8th Prime Minister of Israel
In office
4 November 1995[a] – 18 June 1996
PresidentEzer Weizman
Preceded byYitzhak Rabin
Succeeded byBenjamin Netanyahu
In office
13 September 1984 – 20 October 1986
PresidentChaim Herzog
Preceded byYitzhak Shamir
Succeeded byYitzhak Shamir
Acting
22 April – 21 June 1977
PresidentEphraim Katzir
Preceded byYitzhak Rabin
Succeeded byMenachem Begin
Major ministerial roles
1969–1970Minister of Immigrant Absorption
1970–1974Minister of Communications
1970–1974Minister of Transportation
1974–1977Minister of Information
1974–1977Minister of Defense
1984Minister of Internal Affairs
1984Minister of Religious Affairs
1986–1988Minister of Foreign Affairs
1988–1990Minister of Finance
1992–1995Minister of Foreign Affairs
1995–1996Minister of Defense
2001–2002Minister of Foreign Affairs
Member of the Knesset
In office
March 2006–13 June 2007
November 1959–15 January 2006
Personal details
Born
Szymon Perski

(1923-08-02)2 August 1923
Wiszniew, Poland (now Vishnyeva, Belarus)
Died28 September 2016(2016-09-28) (aged 93)
Ramat Gan, Israel
Resting placeMount Herzl, Jerusalem
NationalityIsraeli
Political party
Other political
affiliations		Alignment (1965–1991)
Spouse
​
​
(m. 1945; died 2011)​
RelationsLauren Bacall (cousin)
Uzi Peres (nephew)
Children
Alma mater
AwardsNobel Peace Prize (1994)
Signature
Military service
AllegianceIsrael
Branch/service
a. ^ Acting: 4–22 November 1995

From a young age, he was renowned for his oratorical brilliance, and was chosen as a protégé by David Ben-Gurion, Israel's founding father.[6] He began his political career in the late 1940s, holding several diplomatic and military positions during and directly after the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. His first high-level government position was as deputy director general of defense in 1952 which he attained at the age of 28, and director general from 1953 until 1959.[7] In 1956, he took part in the historic negotiations on the Protocol of Sèvres[8] described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the "highest form of statesmanship".[9] In 1963, he held negotiations with U.S. President John F. Kennedy, which resulted in the sale of Hawk anti-aircraft missiles to Israel, the first sale of U.S. military equipment to Israel.[10] Peres represented Mapai, Rafi, the Alignment, Labor and Kadima in the Knesset, and led Alignment and Labor.[11]

Peres first succeeded Yitzhak Rabin as acting prime minister briefly during 1977, before becoming prime minister from 1984 to 1986. As foreign minister under Prime Minister Rabin, Peres engineered the 1994 Israel–Jordan peace treaty,[12] and won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize together with Rabin and Yasser Arafat for the Oslo Accords peace talks with the Palestinian leadership.[7] In 1996, he founded the Peres Center for Peace, which has the aim of "promot[ing] lasting peace and advancement in the Middle East by fostering tolerance, economic and technological development, cooperation and well-being."[13] After suffering a stroke, Peres died in 2016 near Tel Aviv.[14][15]

Early life

Shimon Peres was born Szymon Perski, on 2 August 1923,[16] in Wiszniew, Poland (now Vishnyeva, Belarus), to Yitzhak (1896–1962) and Sara (1905–1969, née Meltzer) Perski.[7][17] The family spoke Hebrew, Yiddish and Russian at home, and Peres learned Polish at school. He then learned to speak English and French.[18] His father was a wealthy timber merchant, later branching out into other commodities; his mother was a librarian. Peres had a younger brother, Gershon.[19] He was related to the American film star Lauren Bacall (born Betty Joan Perske), and they were described as first cousins,[20] but Peres said, "In 1952 or 1953, I came to New York... Lauren Bacall called me, said that she wanted to meet, and we did. We sat and talked about where our families came from, and discovered that we were from the same family... but I'm not exactly sure what our relation is... It was she who later said that she was my cousin; I didn't say that".[21]

 
Shimon Peres (standing, third from right) with his family, ca. 1930

Peres told Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson that he had been born as a result of a blessing his parents had received from a chassidic rebbe and that he was proud of it.[22] Peres's grandfather, Rabbi Zvi Meltzer, a grandson of Rabbi Chaim Volozhin, had a great impact on his life. In an interview, Peres said: "As a child, I grew up in my grandfather's home. … I was educated by him. … My grandfather taught me Talmud. It was not as easy as it sounds. My home was not an observant one. My parents were not Orthodox but I was Haredi. At one point, I heard my parents listening to the radio on the Sabbath and I smashed it."[23] When he was a child, Peres was taken by his father to Radun to receive a blessing from Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan (known as "the Chofetz Chaim").[24] As a child, Peres would later say, "I did not dream of becoming president of Israel. My dream as a boy was to be a shepherd or a poet of stars."[25] He inherited his love of French literature from his maternal grandfather.[26]

In 1932, Peres's father immigrated to Mandatory Palestine and settled in Tel Aviv. The family followed him in 1934.[19] He attended Balfour Elementary School and High School, and Geula Gymnasium (High School for Commerce) in Tel Aviv. At 15, he transferred to Ben Shemen agricultural school and lived on Kibbutz Geva for several years.[19] Peres was one of the founders of Kibbutz Alumot.

In 1941, he was elected Secretary of HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed, a Labor Zionist youth movement, and in 1944 returned to Alumot, where he had an agricultural training and worked as a farmer and a shepherd.[27]

 
Peres at 13-years-old in 1936

At age 20, he was elected to the HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed national secretariat, where he was only one of two Mapai party supporters, out of the 12 members. Three years later, he took over the movement and won a majority. The head of Mapai, David Ben-Gurion, and Berl Katznelson began to take an interest in him, and appointed him to Mapai's secretariat.[28]

In 1944, Peres led an illicit expedition into the Negev, then a closed military zone requiring a permit to enter. The expedition, consisting of a group of teenagers, along with a Palmach scout, a zoologist, and an archaeologist, had been funded by Ben-Gurion and planned by Palmach head Yitzhak Sadeh, as part of a plan for future Jewish settlement of the area so as to include it in the Jewish state.[29] The group was arrested by a Bedouin camel patrol led by a British officer, taken to Beersheba (then a small Arab town) and incarcerated in the local jail. All of the participants were sentenced to two weeks in prison, and as the leader, Peres was also heavily fined.[30] The expedition came across a nest of bearded vultures, called peres in Hebrew, and from this Peres took his Hebrew name.[31]

All of Peres's relatives who remained in Wiszniew in 1941 were murdered during the Holocaust,[32] many of them (including Rabbi Meltzer) burned alive in the town's synagogue.[33]

In 1945, Peres married Sonya Gelman, who preferred to remain outside the public eye. They had three children.[34]

In 1946, Peres and Moshe Dayan were chosen as the two youth delegates in the Mapai delegation to the Zionist Congress in Basel.[28]

In 1947, Peres joined the Haganah, the predecessor of the Israel Defense Forces. David Ben-Gurion made him responsible for personnel and arms purchases; he was appointed to head the naval service when Israel received independence in 1948.[29]

Peres was director of the Defense Ministry's delegation in the United States in the early 1950s. While in the U.S. he studied English, economics, and philosophy at The New School and New York University, and completed a four-month advanced management course at Harvard University.[19][35][36][37]

Director General of the Ministry of Defense (1953-1959)

 
Peres (center) with Ezer Weizman and King Mahendra of Nepal in 1958

In 1952, Peres was appointed deputy director general of the Ministry of Defense, and the following year, he was promoted to director general.[29] At age 29, he was the youngest person to hold this position.[38] He was involved in arms purchases and establishing strategic alliances that were important for the State of Israel. He was instrumental in establishing close relations with France, securing massive amounts of quality arms that, in turn, helped to tip the balance of power in the region.[39]

In 1955, he testified against Minister of Defense Pinhas Lavon in what became known as the Lavon Affair.[citation needed]

Owing to Peres's mediation, Israel acquired the advanced Dassault Mirage III French jet fighter, established the Dimona nuclear reactor and entered into a tri-national agreement with France and the United Kingdom, positioning Israel in what would become the 1956 Suez Crisis. Peres continued as a primary intermediary in the close French-Israeli alliance from the mid-1950s,[29] although from 1958, he was often involved in tense negotiations with Charles de Gaulle over the Dimona project.[40]

Peres is considered to have been the architect of Israel's secret nuclear weapons program in the 1960s, and he stated that, in the 1960s, he recruited Arnon Milchan, an Israeli-American Hollywood film producer, billionaire businessman, and secret arms dealer and intelligence operative, to work for the Israeli Bureau of Scientific Relations (LEKEM or LAKAM), a secret intelligence organization tasked with obtaining military technology and science espionage.[41]

1956 Suez Crisis

Main article: Suez Crisis

From 1954, as director general of the Ministry of Defense, Peres was involved in the planning of the 1956 Suez War, in partnership with France and Britain. Peres was sent by David Ben-Gurion to Paris, where he held secret meetings with the French government.[42] Peres was instrumental in negotiating the Franco-Israeli agreement for a military offensive.[43] In November 1954, Peres visited Paris, where he was received by the French Defense Minister Marie-Pierre Kœnig, who told him that France would sell Israel any weapons it wanted to buy.[44] By early 1955, France was shipping large amounts of weapons to Israel.[44] In April 1956, following another visit to Paris by Peres, France agreed to disregard the Tripartite Declaration, and supply more weapons to Israel.[45] During the same visit, Peres informed the French that Israel had decided upon war with Egypt in 1956.[46] Throughout the 1950s, an extraordinarily close relationship existed between France and Israel, characterised by unprecedented cooperation in the fields of defense and diplomacy. For his work as the architect of this relationship, Peres was awarded the highest order of the French, the Legion of Honor, as Commander.[38][47]

At Sèvres, Peres took part in planning alongside Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury, Christian Pineau and Chief of Staff of the French Armed Forces General Maurice Challe, and British Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd and his assistant Sir Patrick Dean.[8] Britain and France enlisted Israeli support for an alliance against Egypt. The parties agreed that Israel would invade the Sinai. Britain and France would then intervene, purportedly to separate the warring Israeli and Egyptian forces, instructing both to withdraw to a distance of 16 kilometres from either side of the canal.[48] The British and French would then argue, according to the plan, that Egypt's control of such an important route was too tenuous, and that it needed be placed under Anglo-French management. The agreement at Sèvres was initially described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the "highest form of statesmanship".[9] The three allies, especially Israel, were mainly successful in attaining their immediate military objectives. However, the extremely hostile reaction to the Suez Crisis from both the United States and the USSR forced them to withdraw, resulting in a failure of Britain and France's political and strategic aims of controlling the Suez Canal.

Early Knesset career (1959–1974)

 
Shimon Peres with Yitzak Rabin and Levi Eshkol in 1964

Peres was first elected to the Knesset in the 1959 elections[49][29] as a member of the Mapai party.[38] He was given the role of deputy minister of defense, which he filled until 1965 (holding this position in the 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th governments of Israel under Prime Ministers David Ben-Gurion and Levi Eshkol).[38] In this position, he held negotiations with John F. Kennedy, which concluded with the sale of Hawk anti-aircraft missiles to Israel, the first sale of US military equipment to Israel.[10]

Peres resigned from the 12th government in late May 1965, citing the growing rift between Prime Minister Eshkol and former prime minister Ben-Gurion (Peres was aligned with Ben Gurion).[50][51] In 1965, Peres and Moshe Dayan were among those that left Mapai with David Ben-Gurion when Ben-Gurion formed a new party, Rafi.[38] Peres was a co-founder of the Rafi party.[52] The party reconciled with Mapai in 1968, merging to form the Israeli Labor Party. The Labor Party then joined the Alignment (a left-wing alliance).[38]

In 1969, Peres was appointed minister of immigrant absorption in the 15th government (led by Prime Minister Golda Meir), and in 1970 (also in the 15th government), he became minister of transportation and communications.[38] After this, he served as minister of information in the Meir-led 16th government.[29][38]

Minister of Defense (1974–1977)

Peres was appointed minister of defense in the Yitzhak Rabin-led 17th government, after having been Rabin's chief rival for the post of Labor Party leader (and, in effect, the Israeli premiership) in the 1974 Israeli Labor Party leadership election that was held after Golda Meir resigned in the aftermath of the Yom Kippur War.[29][38]

1976 Entebbe rescue operation

Main article: Operation Entebbe

On 27 June 1976, Peres, as minister of defense, in collaboration with Prime Minister Rabin, handled Israel's response to a coordinated act of terrorism when 248 Paris-bound travelers on an Air France plane were taken hostage by pro-Palestinian hijackers and flown to Uganda, Africa, 2,000 miles away.

Peres and Rabin were responsible for approving what became known as the "Operation Entebbe", which took place on 4 July 1976. The rescue boosted the Rabin government's approval rating with the public.[53] The only Israeli soldier that was killed during the successful rescue operation was its commander, 30-year-old Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Netanyahu, older brother of Benjamin Netanyahu.[54]

Before Rabin ultimately approved the rescue mission, he and Peres were at odds on how to proceed. Rabin was open to acquiescing to the terrorists' demands to release forty Palestinian militants if no military option presented itself. Peres, however, felt acquiescing to be a nonstarter, believing it would encourage further terrorism.[55] Rabin initially took steps to begin negotiations with the terrorists, seeing no other option. Peres felt that negotiating with terrorists would, in effect, be a surrender, and thought a rescue operation should be planned.[56]

Peres organized a secret Israel Crisis Committee to come up with a rescue plan. When a plan had been made, he met with commander Netanyahu a number of times.[57] During one of their final private meetings, they both examined maps and went over precise details. Peres later said of Netanyahu's explanation, "My impression was one of exactitude and imagination," saying that Netanyahu seemed confident the operation would succeed with almost no losses.[57] Netanyahu left the meeting understanding that Peres would do everything in his power to see that the operation went smoothly.[57] Peres then went unannounced to Moshe Dayan, the former minister of Ddfense, interrupting his dinner with friends in a restaurant, to show him the latest plan to get his opinion. Peres told Dayan of the objections that had been raised by Rabin and Chief of Staff, Mordechai Gur. Dayan dismissed the objections after reviewing the written details: "Shimon," he said, "this is a plan that I support not one hundred percent but one hundred and fifty percent! There has to be a military operation."[56] Peres later got the approval from Gur, who became fully supportive.[56] Peres then took the plan to Rabin, who had been lukewarm and still didn't like the risks, but he reluctantly approved the plan after Peres answered a number of key questions and Rabin learned that the cabinet had also endorsed it.[58]

Shortly after the mission ended, Rabin recounted, "we called into my office seven of our top commanders...I told our friends in uniform that the honor of the Jewish people, their destinies, are challenged and what we are considering is not just a calculated risk in the military sense, but a comparative risk, which exists between surrender to terror and daring rescue stemming from independence."[59]

After the success of the operation, Peres angled to receive some of the credit and adulation, somewhat competing with Rabin for credit.[59]

Unsuccessful February 1977 campaign for Labor Party leader

Main article: February 1977 Israeli Labor Party leadership election

In February 1977, Peres challenged Prime Minister Rabin for the leadership of Labor Party, but lost to Rabin in a narrow 50.72% to 49.28% result in the vote by the party's Central Committee.[60][29][61][62] The leadership election was expected to determine who would lead the party into the 1977 Knesset election. This was at moment when Labor was threatened with the prospect of losing its control of government after 28-consecutive years due to the rise of both the right-wing Likud bloc and the centrist Democratic Movement for Change, which were seen as collectively cutting into the Labor Party's support in the upcoming election. At the time, Rabin and Peres presented little policy difference, with Peres being seen as only slightly to the right of Rabin on domestic matters. Instead of positioning himself in contrast to the incumbent Rabin on policy, Peres instead capitalized off of the political atmosphere and staked his candidacy largely on an argument that the Labor Party needed to satisfy the nation's desire for change by choosing a new leader for itself.[61]

Unofficial acting premiership (1977)

On 8 April 1977, Prime Minister Rabin announced that, in the wake of a foreign currency scandal involving his wife, he would be stepping down prior to the 1977 Knesset election.[63] Peres made himself a candidate to replace him as the new Labor Party leader. Initially, Foreign Minister Yigal Allon also made himself a candidate. However, Allon and Peres reached an agreement that Peres would appoint Allon to any ministerial position that Allon preferred in exchange from his withdrawal of his candidacy. Following Allon's withdrawal, the Labor Party leadership announced on 10 April 1977 that they had chosen to endorse Peres as the party's new leader. On 11 April 1977, the 815-member Central Committee of the party elected Peres by acclamation as the party's new leader.[60][64][65]

Rabin ended his active service as prime minister on 22 April 1977, and Peres became Israel's unofficial acting prime minister. The reason why Peres was not officially the holder of this office was that Rabin could not, under Israeli law, resign from his position as prime minister because the government was, at the time, a caretaker government.[38][66][67][68][69]

In his first election as party leader, Peres led Labor Party and the Alignment coalition to its first ever electoral defeat, and the result afforded the first-place Likud party (led by Menachem Begin) the ability to form a coalition that excluded the left. When the new Likud-led government was formed on 20 June 1977[70] Peres' time as the unofficial acting prime minister ended.

Labor in opposition (1977–1984)

Once the Likud-led government took power, Labor and the Alignment bloc entered the Knesset opposition for the first time in its history,[71] and Peres assumed the unofficial role of Knesset opposition leader.[52]

In 1978, Peres was elected vice president of Socialist International.[72] Through his role within the leadership of this organization, Peres befriended foreign politicians including Willy Brandt, Bruno Kreisky, members of the British Labour Party, and politicians from parts of Africa and Asia.[73]

After handily winning reelection as Labor Party leader in 1980 (defeating a challenge from Rabin, who was attempting a comeback to the leadership),[60] Peres led his party to another, narrower, loss in the 1981 elections.

Labor–Likud grand coalition rotation government (1984–1988)

In the 1984 elections (Peres' third election as Labor Party leader), the Alignment coalition won more seats than any other party, but the left-wing failed to win the majority of 61 seats needed to form a coalition on their own. Alignment and Likud agreed to an unusual “rotation" arrangement to form a grand coalition unity government during which, for the first twenty-five months, Peres would serve as prime minister and the Likud leader Yitzhak Shamir would be foreign minister, with the two swapping positions thereafter for the second half of the term.[29][38][74]

First premiership (1984–1986)

See also: Twenty-first government of Israel
 
Prime Minister Peres delivers a speech in front of Ethiopian Jewish immigrants, 2 October 1985

Peres was regarded to be a popular prime minister in his two years as premier under the rotation arrangement.[75] During a portion of his premiership, he also held the position of minister of religious affairs.[52]

Military policy and international relations

Among the most noteworthy moments of his first tenure as prime minister was Operation Wooden Leg (a long-range Israeli airstrike against the PLO headquarters in Tunisia) and a trip to Morocco to confer with King Hassan II.[76][77]

In 1985, Peres publicly supported the quick pursuit of a military pullback from Beirut to Israel's south Lebanon security belt.[78] A partial Israeli pullback had earlier been approved in 1983 by the Begin-headed Likud-led government that had been in power at that time.[79]

1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan

Main article: 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan

A major domestic policy decision of Peres' first premiership was the implementation of the 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan.

By 1985, Israel's economic fortunes were looking dire, with immense and quickly rising inflation (Israel was experiencing hyperinflation), a government budget deficit equal to between twelve and fifteen percent of the nation's GDP and national debt equal to 220% of the nation's GDP, and Israel's foreign currency reserves were quickly dissipating.[80] With the assistance of the government of the United States, Peres assembled a board of American economist to advise him on the situation. Conditional on him implementing reforms, Peres secured emergency economic assistance from the United States of $750 million (equivalent to 3.5% of the nation's GDP at the time) annually over a two-year period.[81]

Peres was initially hesitant to take the drastic measures that he ultimately would pursue, as they had the strong potential of proving unpopular and came with a risk of potentially creating a drastic increase in unemployment.[81] Peres ultimately was convinced to push through the 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan. Once convinced, he was assertive in pushing for the passage of the program, which was quickly after approved by his cabinet on 1 July 1985. This program had quick success in improving the course of the Israeli economy. By the end of the year, inflation immensely decreased. Additionally, the shekel stabilized and the government balanced its budget. While Israel would subsequently slide into a recession, the stabilization has been regarded as an important and greatly successful model for addressing economies in crisis, and has been credited with saving the nation's economy.[80][81][82]

Minister of Foreign Affairs (1986–1988)

As per the rotation arrangement, after Peres' two years as prime minister, he and Shamir traded places in 1986, with Shamir becoming prime minister of the new twenty-second government of Israel and Peres becoming foreign minister. During this government, Peres was the designated acting prime minister of Israel.

Minister of Finance in a Likud-led grand coalition government (1988–1990)

In 1988 the Alignment, led by Peres, suffered another narrow defeat. This came despite the fact that polling in 1988 showed Peres to be the most popular politician in the nation.[83] Peres agreed to renew the grand coalition with the Likud, this time conceding the premiership to Shamir for the entire term. In the grand coalition unity government of 1988–90 (the twenty-third government of Israel), Peres served as minister of finance and also continued to be the designated acting prime minister of Israel.

Labor's return to the opposition (1990–1992)

"The dirty trick"

Peres and the Alignment finally left the government in 1990, after "the dirty trick" – a failed bid by Peres to form a narrow government based on a coalition of the Alignment, small leftist factions and ultra-orthodox parties.[84] Peres' hope had been to create a Labor-led government that would be focused on peace talks with Palestine. Likud had declined proposals by the United States for Israel and Palestine to initiate what would have been the first peace talks between the two sides. Peres' longtime intra-party rival, Yizhak Rabin, had opposed to overthrowing the Likud-led coalition government.[75] Peres succeeded in ending the government twenty-third government with a vote of no confidence.[74] However, Peres was subsequently unable to assemble enough Knesset partners to form a pro-peace talk government.[75] After two months, Shamir managed to form a Likud-led government with right-wing religious parties, establishing what was seen as the most conservative government coalition in the history of Israel up to that point.[74][75]

Defeat in the 1992 Labor Party leadership election

Peres led the opposition in the Knesset from 1990 until early 1992, when he was defeated by Yitzhak Rabin in the Israeli Labor Party leadership election, the first leadership election held since the party formally merged with the other parties of Alignment, and the first leadership election open to participation by the party's entire membership.[29][60] Peres remained active in politics, however.[29]

Minister of Foreign Affairs in a Labor-led government (1992–1995)

After the Labor Party was successful in the 1992 Knesset election and Rabin became prime minister again, Rabin made Peres foreign minister in his government.[29] Peres had previously served as foreign minister from 1986 through 1988.

Israel–Jordan peace treaty

 
Shimon Peres (left) with Yitzhak Rabin (center) and King Hussein of Jordan (right), prior to signing the Israel–Jordan peace treaty

On 26 October 1994, Jordan and Israel signed the Israel–Jordan peace treaty,[12] which had been initiated by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres. The ceremony was held in the Arava valley of Israel, north of Eilat and near the Jordanian border. Prime Minister Rabin and Prime Minister Abdelsalam al-Majali signed the treaty and the President of Israel Ezer Weizman shook hands with King Hussein. United States President Bill Clinton observed, accompanied by United States Secretary of State Warren Christopher, as well as the foreign ministers of eleven other nations (including Russia, which had joined the United States as a formal co-sponsor of the peace talks that led to the treaty). The treaty brought an end to 46 years of official war between Israel and Jordan. It was only the second full peace agreement that Israel had reached with an Arab nation, after the Camp David Accords signed with Egypt in 1978.[85]

Oslo peace process with Palestine

Main article: Oslo Accords
 
Peres signing Oslo I on 13 September 1993

Rabin's 1992 campaign for Labor had primarily been run on the idea of negotiating peace with the Palestinians. This campaign had succeeded as a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was popular among the Israeli public at the time. The twenty-fifth government of Israel was arguably more pro-peace government than any previous Israeli government.[74] Rabin's government would begin negotiations with the Yasser Arafat-led Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).

Peres was involved in secret peace negotiations between Prime Minister Rabin's government and Arafat's PLO organization. These negotiations were held over several months in 1992 and 1993. As part of the negotiations, Peres secretly flew to Oslo, Norway on 19 August 1993. The ultimate agreement outlined a peace process between Israel and Palestine, which would include the establishment of an interim Palestinian government within both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. On 13 September 1993, Peres signed the initial Oslo I Accord on behalf of the Israeli government at in a ceremony at the United States' White House, with Rabin in attendance.[86]

 
Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat receiving the Nobel Peace Prize following the Oslo Accords

In 1994, in recognition of the Oslo Accords, Peres, Rabin and Arafat were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.[86] This was the second (and most recent) instance in which an Israeli was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin had previously jointly received the honor with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in 1978. This was also the second time that the award had been given in recognition of middle east peacemaking efforts, with the 1978 award having been the previous instance of this.[87] The awarding of the prize to the three has not been without controversy. After it was decided they would be given the award, Kåre Kristiansen resigned from the Nobel Peace Prize committee in protest of Arafat receiving the award, believing Arafat to be, "too tainted by violence, terror and torture".[87] In 2002, a number of members of the Norwegian committee that awards the annual Nobel Peace Prize would state they regretted that Mr. Peres's prize could not be recalled. Because he had not acted to prevent Israel's re-occupation of Palestinian territory, he had not lived up to the ideals he expressed when he accepted the prize, and he was involved in human rights abuses.[88]

Negotiations on further terms continued, with Peres continuing to be an integral player.[89][90] On 28 September 1995, Rabin and Arafat jointly signed a second major agreement, which has popularly been referred to as "Oslo II".[86][89]

Second premiership (1995–1996)

See also: Twenty-fifth government of Israel and Twenty-sixth government of Israel
 
Peres (far left) and Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (far right) during the 4 November 1995 peace rally at which Rabin was assassinated
 
Shimon Peres with U.S. President Bill Clinton at the White House, April 1996

While the Oslo peace policies, at the time, enjoyed the support of most Israelis, they also faced intense opposition from extreme members of Israel’s right-wing.[74] In response to intense street protests by right-wing opponents of the Oslo peace process, a coalition of left-wing parties and peace groups organized a rally in support of the peace process in Tel Aviv's Kings Square on 4 November 1995, which both Prime Minister Rabin and Peres attended. While making his way from the stage to his car after concluding his speech to the gathered crowd of more than 100,000 people, Rabin was assassinated by Yigal Amir, a right-wing Israeli Jew who opposed the peace process.[86][91][92][93][94]

After Rabin's assassination, Peres was made acting prime minister and acting defense minister of a provisional government.[38][92][95] On 14 November 1995, the Labor Party confirmed Peres as its new leader, which thereby cleared the last formality before he could be invited by President Ezer Weizman to form a new government.[60][96] On 15 November 1995, Peres was invited by to form a new government. On 21 November, Peres signed a coalition agreement between Labor, Meretz and Yiud (which had been members of Rabin's government), which was formally approved by the Knesset the next day, establishing a new government with Peres as prime minister.[95]

Peres' second stint as prime minister (both acting and official) ultimately lasted a total of seven months. During this time, Peres attempted to maintain the momentum of the peace process.[38]

On 10 February 1996, Peres made the widely expected announcement that he would call early elections, moving the elections to late May, five months earlier than they otherwise were to be held. The election would be the first to use a new system in which the prime minister was directly elected in a vote coinciding with the Knesset election.[94] Peres had hoped that early elections would deliver a mandate for his pursuit of a two-state solution.[97] Peres had called the elections early because of promising polls.[94] Peres was heavily leading in the polls for the prime minister vote at the time the election was called, with polls showing him to have between a twenty and twenty-five percent lead.[52][94] Additionally, Labor was also leading in polls for the Knesset vote. Despite the promising polls, however, some in Labor had, even at this time, expressed concerns about the ability of Peres to win, given his failure to deliver an outright win for the Labor Party during his earlier stint as party leader.[94] Peres' lead in the polls began to decrease after the Jaffa Road bus bombings on 25 February 1996. However, even in the last month before the election, Peres enjoyed a smaller lead of around five percent.[52]

On 11 April 1996, Prime Minister Peres initiated Operation Grapes of Wrath,[98] which was triggered by Hezbollah Katyusha rockets fired into Israel in response to the killing of two Lebanese by an IDF missile. Israel conducted massive air raids and extensive shelling in southern Lebanon. 106 Lebanese civilians died in the shelling of Qana, when a UN compound was hit in an Israeli shelling.[99]

In 1996, Peres founded the Peres Center for Peace, which has the aim of "promot[ing] lasting peace and advancement in the Middle East by fostering tolerance, economic and technological development, cooperation and well-being."[13]

During his term, Peres promoted the use of the internet in Israel and created the first website of an Israeli prime minister.[100]

Labor in opposition (1996–1999)

Peres was narrowly defeated by Benjamin Netanyahu in the 1996 Israeli prime ministerial election. Not included in the new government, Labor became an opposition party again, once again placing Peres in the then-unofficial role of Knesset opposition leader.

Peres did not seek re-election as Labor Party leader in 1997[100] and was replaced by Ehud Barak that year.[101] Barak rebuffed Peres' attempt to secure the position of party president.[100]

Minister of Regional Cooperation in a Labor-led government (1999–2001)

Ehud Barak was elected prime minister and formed a government in 1999. Barak appointed Peres (who was seen as a political rival of the new prime minister) to the minor post of minister of regional cooperation.[100][102] The position was vaguely defined, being expected to be tasked with advancing economic and political ties between Israel and the Arab world.[103][102] The position also did not come with any government funding.[102] Peres accepted the relatively low-ranked position reluctantly.[103]

For nearly all of time in this position, Peres was not given a major role in the government.[104]

On 1 November 2000, amid the Second Intifada, Peres met in the Gaza Strip with Arafat on behalf of the Israeli government, and the two agreed to terms of a truce in the early hours of the next morning.[105][106][107][108][109]

After the resignation of Ezer Weizman, Peres ran in the 2000 Israeli presidential election, seeking to be elected by members of the Knesset to a seven-year term as Israel's president, a ceremonial head of state position which usually authorizes the selection of Prime Minister. However, he lost to Likud candidate Moshe Katsav. Katsav's victory was attributed in part to evidence that Peres planned to use the position to support the increasingly unpopular peace processes of the government of Ehud Barak.[110]

Peres' defeat was considered a significant upset, as he had been thought to be heavily favored to win the Knesset vote.[111] The editorial board of the Los Angeles Times wrote that his defeat appeared to be the end of Peres', "distinguished political career".[112]

There was consideration given later that year to Peres potentially seeking the premiership again. On 20 November 2000, amid polls showing him to be in a virtual-tie with Ariel Sharon, an aide of Peres told the media that he would run in the 2001 direct election for prime minister. Peres himself told lawmakers that he intended to run.[113] Despite this, Peres did not become a candidate.[114] In January 2001, there was some talk among Cabinet members that it would be best for Peres to be the candidate of the left.[104][115] However, this did not happen. In early January 2001, in a joint television appearance with the incumbent prime minister that promoted the government's intent to work towards peace, Peres told the media that his own goal was, "not to become prime minister", but was instead, "to do the best for the state of Israel."[104]

Minister of Foreign Affairs in a Likud-led grand coalition government (2001–2002)

Following Ehud Barak's defeat by Ariel Sharon in the 2001 direct election for prime minister, Peres made yet another comeback. He led helped Labor into a grand coalition unity government with Sharon's Likud (the Twenty-ninth government of Israel) and secured the post of foreign minister.[38] The formal leadership of the party passed to Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, and in 2002 to Mayor of Haifa Amram Mitzna. Peres was much criticized on the left for clinging to his position as foreign minister in a government that was not seen as advancing the peace process, despite his own dovish stance. He left this office only when Labor resigned from the government in advance of the 2003 Knesset election.[38]

Labor in opposition (2002–2005)

Peres left his post as foreign minister following Labor's 2002 exit from the unity government. Labor's departure from the unity government had placed Labor in the opposition.

After the Labor Party suffered a crushing defeat in the 2003 Knesset election while under the leadership of Mitzna, Peres was made interim leader of the party on 19 June 2003.[116]

Vice Prime Minister in a Likud-led grand coalition government (2005)

Peres led the Labor Party into a coalition with Sharon once more, reaching an agreement the end of 2004, and entering the party into the thirtieth government of Israel in January 2005. This came after the Sharon's support of "disengagement" from Gaza presented a diplomatic program that Labor could support.[38] Sharon made Peres vice prime minister.

 
Peres in 2005

As interim party leader, Peres favored putting off the elections for as long as possible. He claimed that an early election would jeopardize both the September 2005 Gaza withdrawal plan and the standing of the party in a national unity government with Sharon. However, the majority pushed for an earlier date, as younger members of the party, among them Amir Peretz, Ophir Pines-Paz and Isaac Herzog, overtook established leaders such as Binyamin Ben-Eliezer and Haim Ramon in the party ballot to divide up government portfolios.[117]

Defeat in the 2005 Labor Party leadership election and departure from Labor Party to Kadima

Peres lost a bid for permanent leadership of the Labor Party to Amir Peretz in the November 2005 leadership election, held in advance of the 2006 elections.[117][118] Peres received 40% of the vote to Peretz's 42.4%.[117]

Labor withdrew from the unity government on 23 November 2005.[119] On 30 November 2005 Peres announced that he was leaving the Labor Party to support Ariel Sharon and his new Kadima party.[38] In the immediate aftermath of Sharon's debilitating stroke days later (which left Sharon in a coma), there was speculation that Peres might take over as leader of the Kadima party; most senior Kadima leaders, however, were former members of Likud and indicated their support for Ehud Olmert as Sharon's successor.[120] Labor reportedly tried to woo Peres to rejoin them.[121] However, he announced that he supported Olmert and would remain with Kadima. Peres had previously announced his intention not to run in the March 2006 elections, but changed his mind.[38]

Peres resigned from the Knesset on 15 January 2006 due both to Attorney General Menahem Mazuz issuing a decision that ruled Peres and several others could not be appointed to ministerial posts by Prime Minister Olmert[122] and because of a law that, due to him having switched parties, would have prevented him from running for the next Knesset if he remained an incumbent member of the Knesset.[123] By that time, he had served in the Knesset for more than forty-six consecutive years.

Peres was soon elected back to the Knesset in the 2006 election, this time as a member of Kadima. After the new Kadima-led government was formed, Peres was given the role of vice prime minister and minister for the development of the Negev, Galilee and Regional Economy.[38]

Presidency (2007–2014)

Main article: Presidency of Shimon Peres
Shimon Peres in December 2007 (audio)
 
Shimon Peres at the World Economic Forum on the Middle East (2009)
 
Shimon Peres meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in the Oval Office, 5 May 2009
 
Shimon Peres and the Foreign Minister of Brazil, Celso Amorim, meet in Brasília, 11 November 2009
 
Shimon Peres addressing a gathering of the World Jewish Congress in Jerusalem (2010)

On 13 June 2007, Peres was elected president of the State of Israel by the Knesset. 58 of 120 members of the Knesset voted for him in the first round (whereas 38 voted for Reuven Rivlin, and 21 for Colette Avital). His opponents then backed Peres in the second round and 86 members of the Knesset voted in his favor,[124] while 23 objected. He resigned from his role as a member of the Knesset the same day, having been a member since November 1959 (except for a three-month period in early 2006), the longest serving in Israeli political history. Peres was sworn in as president on 15 July 2007.[125]

Israel must not only be an asset but a value. A moral, cultural and scientific call for the promotion of man, every man. It must be a good and warm home for Jews who are not Israelis, as well as for Israelis who are not Jews. And it must create equal opportunities for all, without discriminating between religion, nationality, community or sex... I have seen Israel in its most difficult hours and also in moments of achievement and spiritual uplifting. My years place me at an observation point from which can be viewed the scene of our reviving nation, spread out in all its glory... Permit me to remain an optimist. Permit me to be a dreamer of his people. If sometimes the atmosphere is autumnal, and also if today, the day seems suddenly grey, the president Israel has chosen will never tire of encouraging, awakening and reminding - because spring is waiting for us. The spring will definitely come.

— Shimon Peres, President's inaugural address, July 2007[25]

On 20 November 2008, Peres received an honorary knighthood, Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George from Queen Elizabeth II in Buckingham Palace in London.[126]

In June 2011, he was awarded the honorary title of sheikh by Bedouin dignitaries in Hura for his efforts to achieve Middle East peace. Peres thanks his hosts by saying "This visit has been a pleasure. I am deeply impressed by Hura. You have done more for yourselves than anyone else could have". He told the Mayor of Hura, Dr. Muhammad Al-Nabari, and members of Hura's governing council, that they were "part of the Negev. It cannot be developed without developing the Bedouin community, so that it may keep its traditions while joining the modern world."[127]

Post-presidency and death

Peres announced in April 2013 that he would not seek to extend his tenure beyond 2014. His successor, Reuven Rivlin, was elected on 10 June 2014 and took office on 24 July 2014.

In July 2016, Peres founded the 'Israel innovation center' in the Arab neighbourhood of Ajami, Jaffa, aiming to encourage young people from around the world to be inspired by technology.[128]

On 13 September 2016, Peres suffered a severe stroke and was hospitalized at Sheba Medical Center. His condition was reported to be very serious, as he had suffered a massive brain hemorrhage and significant bleeding.[129] Two days later, he was reported as being in a serious but stable condition.[130] However, on 26 September, an examination found irreversible damage to his brainstem, indicating that it was not possible for him to recover, and the following day, his medical condition deteriorated significantly.[131] He died on 28 September at the age of 93.[132][133]

Tributes

On hearing of his death, tributes came from leaders across the world. The President of Russia, Vladimir Putin said: "I was extremely lucky to have met this extraordinary man many times. And every time I admired his courage, patriotism, wisdom, vision and ability."[134] The President of China, Xi Jinping said: "His death is the loss of an old friend for China."[135] The President of India, Pranab Mukherjee said: "Peres would be remembered as a steadfast friend of India."[136] The President of the United States, Barack Obama said: "I will always be grateful that I was able to call Shimon my friend."

Peres was described by The New York Times as having done "more than anyone to build up his country's formidable military might, then [having] worked as hard to establish a lasting peace with Israel's Arab neighbors."[29]

Funeral

 
Peres's grave on the Great Leaders of the Nation section of Mount Herzl

The funeral was held at Mount Herzl in Jerusalem on 30 September 2016, with his burial place in the Great Leaders of the Nation section between former Israeli Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin and Yitzhak Shamir.[137][138]

About 4,000 mourners and world leaders from 75 countries attended the funeral, with President Barack Obama among those who gave a eulogy.[139][140] Since the funeral for Nelson Mandela, this was only the second time Obama traveled overseas for the funeral of a foreign leader.[141] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also spoke.[142][143] Among the other delegates in attendance and speaking were former President Bill Clinton.[144][145] Other delegates included PA President Mahmoud Abbas, President François Hollande of France, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada, German President Joachim Gauck, President Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico and King Felipe VI of Spain.[141] The UK delegation included Prince Charles, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, former Prime Ministers David Cameron, Gordon Brown, and Tony Blair, and Britain's chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis.

Political views

Peres described himself as a "Ben-Gurionist", after his mentor Ben-Gurion.[146] He felt that Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel was a means to a progressive end in which the State of Israel both inspire the world and survive in a region of the world where it was unwelcome.[147]

As a younger man, Peres was once considered a "hawk".[148] He was a protégé of Ben-Gurion and Dayan and an early supporter of the West Bank settlers during the 1970s. However, after becoming the leader of his party his stance evolved. Subsequently, he was seen as a dove, and a strong supporter of peace through economic cooperation. While still opposed, like all mainstream Israeli leaders in the 1970s and early 1980s, to talks with the PLO, he distanced himself from settlers and spoke of the need for "territorial compromise" over the West Bank and Gaza. For a time he hoped that King Hussein of Jordan could be Israel's Arab negotiating partner rather than Yasser Arafat. Peres met secretly with Hussein in London in 1987 and reached a framework agreement with him, but this was rejected by Israel's then Prime Minister, Yitzhak Shamir. Shortly afterward the First Intifada erupted, and whatever plausibility King Hussein had as a potential Israeli partner in resolving the fate of the West Bank evaporated. Subsequently, Peres gradually moved closer to support for talks with the PLO, although he avoided making an outright commitment to this policy until 1993.

Peres was perhaps more closely associated with the Oslo Accords than any other Israeli politician (Rabin included) with the possible exception of his own protégé, Yossi Beilin. He remained an adamant supporter of the Oslo Accords and the Palestinian Authority since their inception despite the First Intifada and the al-Aqsa Intifada (Second Intifada). However, Peres supported Ariel Sharon's military policy of operating the Israeli Defense Forces to thwart suicide bombings.

Peres's foreign policy outlook was markedly realist. To placate Turkey,[149] Peres downplayed the Armenian genocide.[150] Peres stated: "We reject attempts to create a similarity between the Holocaust and the Armenian allegations. Nothing similar to the Holocaust occurred. It is a tragedy what the Armenians went through but not a genocide."[151][152][153] Although Peres himself did not retract the statement, the Israeli Foreign Ministry later issued a cable to its missions which stated that "The minister absolutely did not say, as the Turkish news agency alleged, 'What the Armenians underwent was a tragedy, not a genocide.'"[150] However, according to Armenian news agencies, the statement released by the Israeli consulate in Los Angeles did not include any mention that Peres had not said that the events were not genocide.[150]

On the issue of the nuclear program of Iran and the supposed existential threat this poses for Israel, Peres stated, "I am not in favor of a military attack on Iran, but we must quickly and decisively establish a strong, aggressive coalition of nations that will impose painful economic sanctions on Iran", adding "Iran's efforts to achieve nuclear weapons should keep the entire world from sleeping soundly." In the same speech, Peres compared Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his call to "wipe Israel off the map" to the genocidal threats to European Jewry made by Adolf Hitler in the years prior to the Holocaust.[154] In an interview with Army Radio on 8 May 2006 he remarked that "the president of Iran should remember that Iran can also be wiped off the map."[155] However, after his death it was revealed that Peres had said that he prevented a military strike on Iran's nuclear program that had been ordered by Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak in 2010.[156]

Peres was a proponent of Middle East economic integration.[157]

Technology

Peres is regarded as one of the founders of Israel's technology sector. Through personal meetings with the French government, he established collaboration treaties with France's nuclear industry in 1954. In 1958, he founded the re-organized RAFAEL Armament Development Authority,[158] under the MOD's jurisdiction. From his desk he would control all aspects of Israel's nuclear program (first as director general and after 1959 as deputy mnister).[159] In the 1980s, he is credited with having laid the economic foundations for Israel's start-up economy.[160] In later years, he developed an obsessive fascination with nanotechnology and brain research.[161] He believed that brain research would be the key to a better and more peaceful future.[162] He launched his own nanotechnology investment fund in 2003, raising $5 million in the first week.[163] In 2016, he founded the 'Israel innovation center' in the Arab neighbourhood of Ajami, Jaffa. The center aims to encourage young people from around the world to be inspired by technology. Laying its foundation stone on 21 July 2016, Peres said: “We will prove that innovation has no limits and no barriers. Innovation enables dialogue between nations and between people. It will enable all young people – Jews, Muslims and Christians — to engage in science and technology equally."[164]

Personal life and family

In May 1945, Peres married Sonya Gelman, whom he had met in the Ben Shemen Youth Village, where her father served as a carpentry teacher. The couple married after Sonya finished her military service as a truck driver in the British Army during World War II. Through the years Sonya chose to stay away from the media and keep her privacy and the privacy of her family, despite her husband's extensive political career.[165] Sonya Peres was unable to attend Shimon's 2007 presidential inauguration ceremony because of ill health.[34] With the election of Peres for president, Sonya Peres, who had not wanted her husband to accept the position, announced that she would stay in the couple's apartment in Tel Aviv and not join her husband in Jerusalem. The couple thereafter lived separately.[165] She died on 20 January 2011, aged 87, from heart failure at her apartment in Tel Aviv.[166]

Shimon and Sonya Peres had three children. Their eldest child was a daughter, Dr. Tsvia ("Tsiki") Walden, who became a linguist and professor at Beit Berl Academic College. Their middle child was a son, Yoni, who became director of Village Veterinary Center, a veterinary hospital on the campus of Kfar Hayarok Agricultural School near Tel Aviv. He specializes in the treatment of guide dogs. Their youngest child, Nehemia ("Chemi"), became co-founder and managing general partner of Pitango Venture Capital, one of Israel's largest venture capital funds.[167] Chemi Peres is a former helicopter pilot in the IAF.

Peres was a cousin of actress Lauren Bacall (born Betty Joan Persky), although the two only discovered their relation to each other in the 1950s. Recalling this, Peres once remarked, "In 1952 or 1953 I came to New York... Lauren Bacall called me, said that she wanted to meet, and we did. We sat and talked about where our families came from, and discovered that we were from the same family".[168]

Peres was a polyglot, speaking Polish, French, English, Russian, Yiddish, and Hebrew. He never lost his Polish accent when speaking in Hebrew.[26]

Poetry and song-writing

Peres was a lifelong writer of poetry and songs. As a child in Vishnyeva, Poland he learned to play the mandolin.[169] He wrote his first song when he was 8. He was inspired to write, including during cabinet meetings.[170] Peres was noted to sometimes write stanzas during Cabinet meetings.[170] As a result of his deep literary interests, he could quote from Hebrew prophets, French literature, and Chinese philosophy with equal ease.[26] Many of his poems were turned into songs, with the proceedings of the albums going to charity.[170] His songs have been performed by artists including Andrea Bocelli and Liel Kolet.[171] The most recent of his songs was "Chinese Melody" (recorded in Mandarin with Chinese and Israeli musicians), released in February 2016, which he wrote to celebrate the Year of the Monkey (Music Video of 'Chinese Melody' on YouTube).[172]

Use of social media

During his presidency (2007–2014), Shimon Peres was noted for his embrace of social media to communicate with the public, being described as "Israel's first social media president",[173] which included producing comedic videos on his YouTube channel such as "Be my Friend for Peace"[173] and "Former Israeli President Shimon Peres Goes Job Hunting".[173] After retirement, he led a viral campaign to encourage children to study mathematics. In one video, he sends his answer to the teacher by throwing a paper plane (Video: Shimon Peres throws a paper airplane in the name of education on YouTube).[174] According to The Wall Street Journal, his presence on platforms such as Snapchat, allowed him to "pack more punch—and humor—into the causes he championed, especially peaceful coexistence with the Palestinians."[175]

Places named after Peres

Following his death, it was announced that Israel's Negev nuclear reactor and atomic research center, that had been constructed in 1958, would be named after Peres. Netanyahu stated: "Shimon Peres worked hard to establish this important facility, a facility which has been very important for Israel's security for generations.."[176]

Published works

 
Peres at the 65th Anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising ceremony with Polish president Lech Kaczyński, 2008

Shimon Peres is the author of 11 books, including:

  • The Next Step (1965)
  • David's Sling (1970) (ISBN 0-297-00083-7)
  • And Now Tomorrow (1978)
  • From These Men: seven founders of the State of Israel (1979) (ISBN 0-671-61016-3)
  • Entebbe Diary (1991) (ISBN 965-248-111-4)
  • The New Middle East (1993) (ISBN 0-8050-3323-8)
  • Battling for Peace: A Memoir (1995) (ISBN 0-679-43617-0)
  • For the Future of Israel (1998) (ISBN 0-8018-5928-X)
  • The Imaginary Voyage: With Theodor Herzl in Israel (1999) (ISBN 1-55970-468-3)
  • Ben Gurion: A Political Life (2011) (ISBN 978-0-8052-4282-9)

Awards and recognition

Overview of offices held

Peres twice officially served as prime minister (Israel's head of government). His first stint spanned from 13 September 1984 through 20 October 1986, leading the 21st government during the first half of the 11th Knesset. His second stint lasted from 4 November 1995 through 18 June 1996 (serving in an acting capacity from 4 November through 22 November 1995; and in permanent capacity thereafter), leading the 25th government as interim prime minister and the 26th government as permanent prime minister during the latter portion of the 13th Knesset. In addition to these two official stints as prime minister, Peres is also considered to have served as the de facto acting prime minister from 22 April through 21 June 1977[68] (with Yitzhak Rabin remaining the de jure prime minister). Peres served as president (Israel's head of state) from 15 July 2007 through 24 July 2014.[182] Peres was a member of the Knesset (Israel's legislature), first from November 1959 through 15 January 2006 (a record 47-year tenure),[123] and again from March 2006 through 13 June 2007. His overall Knesset tenure of 48 years is the longest tenure in the history of the Knesset.[183]

Peres, four times, served as the leader of the Knesset's opposition. For his first three stints in this role, the opposition leader was an unofficial and honorary role. His final stint in the position came after Knesset formalized the role as an official position. Peres was the unofficial opposition leader from 20 June 1977 through 13 September 1984, during the entirety of the 9th and 10th Knessets. During this stint, he led the opposition to the Menachem Begin-led 18th and 19th governments and the Yitzhak Shamir-led 20th government of Israel. His second stint as opposition lasted from 15 March 1990 through 13 July 1992, when in lead the opposition to the Yitzhak Shamir-led 24th government during a portion of the 12th Knesset. Peres' third stint lasted from 18 June 1996 to 1 July 1997, and saw him lead the opposition to the Benjamin Netanyahu-led 24th government during a portion of the 14th Knesset. Peres' final stint as opposition leader lasted from 25 June 2003 through 10 January 2005, and saw him lead the opposition to the Ariel Sharon-led 30th government during a portion of the sixteenth Knesset.

Labor Party leadership

Peres thrice served as leader of the Israeli Labor Party.

Tenures as Labor Party leader
Tenure Predecessor Successor Knesset elections as leader Elected/reelected
as leader
December 1977–February 1992 Yitzhak Rabin Yitzhak Rabin 1977
1981
1984
1988		 1977 (Apr), 1980, 1984
November 1995–June 1997 Yitzhak Rabin Ehud Barak 1996 1995
June 2003–November 2005 (interim leader) Amram Mitzna Amir Peretz 2003

Ministerial posts

Peres held numerous ministerial posts over the course of his Knesset tenure. He held major ministerial posts in twelve governments.[183]

Ministerial posts
Ministerial post Tenure Prime Minister(s) Government(s) Predecessor Successor
Deputy Minister of Defense 21 December 1959 – 25 May 1965 David Ben-Gurion (until 26 June 1963)
Levi Eshkol (after 26 June 1963)		 9, 10 11, 12 office established Zvi Dinstein
Minister without Portfolio 15 December 1969 – 22 December 1969 Golda Meir 15 —
Minister of Immigrant Absorption 22 December 1969 – 27 July 1970 Golda Meir 15 Yigal Allon Natan Peled
Minister of Communications 1 September 1970 – 10 March 1974 Golda Meir 15 Elimelekh Rimalt Aharon Uzan
Minister of Transportation 1 September 1970 – 10 March 1974 Golda Meir 15 Ezer Weizman Aharon Yariv
Minister of Information 10 March 1974 – 3 June 1974 Golda Meir 16 office established Aharon Yariv
Minister of Defense (first tenure) 3 June 1974 – 20 June 1977 Yitzhak Rabin 17 Moshe Dayan Ezer Weizman
Minister of Internal Affairs 13 September 1984 – 24 December 1984 Shimon Peres 21 Yosef Burg Yitzhak Peretz
Minister of Religious Affairs 13 September 1984 – 23 December 1984 Shimon Peres 21 Yosef Burg Yosef Burg⋅
Designated Acting Prime Minister 20 October 1986 – 15 March 1990 Yitzhak Shamir 22, 23 Yitzhak Shamir Ehud Olmert (2003)
Minister of Foreign Affairs (first tenure) 20 October 1986 – 23 December 1988 Yitzhak Shamir 22 Yitzhak Shamir Moshe Arens
Minister of Finance 22 December 1988 – 15 March 1990 Yitzhak Shamir 23 Moshe Nissim Yitzhak Shamir
Minister of Foreign Affairs (second tenure) 14 July 1992 – 22 November 1995 Yitzhak Rabin (until 4 November 1995)
Shimon Peres (interim after 4 November 1995)		 25 David Levy Ehud Barak
Minister of Defense (second tenure) 4 November 1995 – 22 November 1995 (interim minister)
22 November 1995 – 18 June 1996 (permanent minister)		 Shimon Peres (interim PM until 22 November 1995 and permanent PM afterwards) 25, 26 Yitzhak Rabin Yitzhak Mordechai
Minister of Regional Cooperation 6 July 1999 – 7 March 2001 Ehud Barak 28 office established Tzipi Livni
Deputy Prime Minister (serving alongside Silvan Shalom, Natan Sharansky, and Eli Yishai) 7 March 2001 – 2 November 2002 Ariel Sharon 29 Binyamin Ben-Eliezer
Minister of Foreign Affairs (third tenure) 7 March 2001 – 2 October 2002 Ariel Sharon 29 Shlomo Ben-Ami Ariel Sharon
Vice Prime Minister (first tenure) 10 January 2005 – 23 November 2005 Ariel Sharon 30 office established
Vice Prime Minister (second tenure) 10 January 2006 – 13 June 2007 Ehud Olmert 31 Haim Ramon
Minister for the Development of the Negev, Galilee and Regional Economy 10 January 2006 – 13 June 2007 Ehud Olmert 31 office established Yaakov Edri

Other offices

From 1952 through 1953, Peres was the deputy director general of the Israeli Ministry of Defense. From 1952 through 1959, he was the director general.

Peres served as vice president of Socialist International. He was elected vice president in 1978.

Electoral history

1996 direct election for Prime Minister

1996 Israeli prime ministerial election[184]
Party Candidate Votes %
Likud Benjamin Netanyahu 1,501,023 50.50
Labor Shimon Peres (incumbent) 1,471,566 49.50
Total votes 2,972,589 100

Presidential elections

2000 Israeli presidential election[185][186]
Party Candidate First round Second round
Votes % Votes %
Likud Moshe Katsav 60 50 63 52.5
One Israel Shimon Peres 57 47.5 57 47.5
Abstaining 3 2.5
Total 120 100 120 100
2007 Israeli presidential election[187]
Party Candidate First round Second round
Votes % Votes %
Kadima Shimon Peres 58 52.73 86 78.90
Likud Reuven Rivlin 31 28.18
Labor Colette Avital 21 19.09
Against 23 19.10
Total 110 100 109 100

Party leadership elections

1974 Israeli Labor Party leadership election[188][60]
Candidate Votes %
Yitzhak Rabin 298 53.99
Shimon Peres 254 46.02
Total votes 552 100
February 1977 Israeli Labor Party leadership election[60][62]
Candidate Votes %
Yitzhak Rabin (incumbent) 1,445 50.72
Shimon Peres 1,404 49.28
Total votes 1,997 100
April 1977 Israeli Labor Party leadership election[65][60]
Candidate Votes %
Shimon Peres unchallenged
(acclamation) 		100
1980 Israeli Labor Party leadership election[60]
Candidate Votes %
Shimon Peres (incumbent) 2,123 70.81
Yitzhak Rabin 875 29.19
Total votes 2,998 100
1984 Israeli Labor Party leadership election
Candidate Votes %
Shimon Peres (incumbent) unchallenged 100
1992 Israeli Labor Party leadership election[60][189]
Candidate Votes %
Yizhak Rabin 40.6
Shimon Peres (incumbent) 34.5
Yisrael Kessar 19.0
Ora Namir 5.5
Total votes 108,347 100
Voter turnout 70.10%
2003 Israeli Labor Party interim leader election[190]
Candidate Votes %
Shimon Peres 631 49.14
Efraim Sneh 359 27.96
Danny Atar 281 21.89
Abstaining 11 1.01
Total votes 1,284 100
Voter turnout 52%
2005 Israeli Labor Party leadership election[60][191]
Candidate Votes %
Amir Peretz 27,098 42.2
Shimon Peres (interim inccumbent) 25,572 39.82
Binyamin Ben-Eliezer 10,764 16.76
Voter turnout 63.88%

See also

References

  1. ^ "Peres". Collins English Dictionary. HarperCollins. Retrieved 22 June 2019.
  2. ^ . Lexico UK English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. Archived from the original on 24 April 2022.
  3. ^ "Peres". Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Retrieved 22 June 2019.
  4. ^ Amiram Barkat. . Haaretz. Archived from the original on 4 September 2007. Retrieved 6 July 2008.
  5. ^ Shimon Peres: The Last Link to Israel's Founding Fathers by DAVID A. GRAHAM 27 September 2016, The Atlantic
  6. ^ MAKING HISTORY By Benny Morris 26 July 2010, Tablet Magazine
  7. ^ a b c d Tore Frängsmyr, ed. (1995). "Shimon Peres, The Nobel Peace Prize 1994". The Nobel Foundation.
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Further reading

  • Bar-Zohar, Michael. Shimon Peres: The Biography (Random House, 2007).
  • Crichlow, Scott. "Idealism or Pragmatism? An Operational Code Analysis of Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres." Political Psychology 19.4 (1998): 683–706.
  • Golan, Matti. The Road to Peace: A Biography of Shimon Peres (Grand Central Pub, 1989).
  • Weiner, Justus R. "An Analysis of the Oslo II Agreement in Light of the Expectations of Shimon Peres and Mahmoud Abbas." Michigan Journal of International Law 17.3 (1996): 667–704. online
  • Ziv, Guy. Why hawks become doves: Shimon Peres and foreign policy change in Israel (SUNY Press, 2014).
  • Ziv, Guy. "Shimon Peres and the French-Israeli Alliance, 1954–9." Journal of Contemporary History 45.2 (2010): 406–429. online[dead link]
  • Ziv, Guy. "The Triumph of agency over structure: Shimon Peres and the Israeli nuclear program." International negotiation 20.2 (2015): 218–241. online[dead link]

External links

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Shimon Peres.
 
Wikiquote has quotations related to Shimon Peres.
  • Official Israeli Presidency website
  • Shimon Peres on the Knesset website
  • Official channel on YouTube
  • The day Peres became a Sheikh!(in Persian)
  • Biography at the Encyclopædia Britannica
  • Shimon Peres on Nobelprize.org   with the Nobel Lecture
  • Shimon Peres biography at the Jewish Virtual Library
  • Appearances on C-SPAN
  • Shimon Peres on Charlie Rose
  • Column archive at The Guardian
  • Shimon Peres collected news and commentary at Ha'aretz
  • Shimon Peres collected news and commentary at The Jerusalem Post
  • Shimon Peres collected news and commentary at The New York Times
  • BBC – Sharon seals new Israel coalition
  • Peres's metaphysical propensity to lose by Matthew Wagner, published in The Jerusalem Post, 10 November 2005.
  • – recorded Report from IsraCast.
  • on 31 July 2006
  • "Presidency rounds off 66-year career" by Amiram Barkat, Haaretz
  • President Peres's address to the 63rd session of the United Nations General Assembly, 24 September 2008
  • Segment Interview on YouTube by Leon Charney on The Leon Charney Report
  • Full Interview on YouTube by Leon Charney on The Leon Charney Report
Party political offices
Preceded by Leader of the Alignment
1977–1992 		Succeeded by
Leader of the Labor Party
1995–1996 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Leader of the Labor Party
2003–2005 		Succeeded by
Political offices
Preceded by Prime Minister of Israel
Acting
1977 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Prime Minister of Israel
1984–1986 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Prime Minister of Israel
1995–1996 		Succeeded by
Preceded by President of Israel
2007–2014 		Succeeded by

January 26, 2023
shimon, peres, hebrew, שמעון, פרס, ʃiˌmon, ˈpeʁes, listen, born, szymon, perski, august, 1923, september, 2016, israeli, politician, served, eighth, prime, minister, israel, from, 1984, 1986, from, 1995, 1996, ninth, president, israel, from, 2007, 2014, member. Shimon Peres ʃ iː ˌ m oʊ n ˈ p ɛr ɛ s ɛ z 1 2 3 Hebrew שמעון פרס ʃiˌmon ˈpeʁes listen born Szymon Perski 2 August 1923 28 September 2016 was an Israeli politician who served as the eighth prime minister of Israel from 1984 to 1986 and from 1995 to 1996 and as the ninth president of Israel from 2007 to 2014 He was a member of twelve cabinets and represented five political parties in a political career spanning 70 years 4 Peres was elected to the Knesset in November 1959 and except for a three month long interregnum in early 2006 served as a member of the Knesset continuously until he was elected president in 2007 Serving in the Knesset for 48 years with the first uninterrupted stretch lasting more than 46 years Peres is the longest serving member in the Knesset s history At the time of his retirement from politics in 2014 he was the world s oldest head of state and was considered the last link to Israel s founding generation 5 Shimon Peresשמעון פרסPeres in 19969th President of IsraelIn office 15 July 2007 24 July 2014Prime MinisterEhud OlmertBenjamin NetanyahuPreceded byMoshe KatsavSucceeded byReuven Rivlin8th Prime Minister of IsraelIn office 4 November 1995 a 18 June 1996PresidentEzer WeizmanPreceded byYitzhak RabinSucceeded byBenjamin NetanyahuIn office 13 September 1984 20 October 1986PresidentChaim HerzogPreceded byYitzhak ShamirSucceeded byYitzhak ShamirActing 22 April 21 June 1977PresidentEphraim KatzirPreceded byYitzhak RabinSucceeded byMenachem BeginMajor ministerial roles1969 1970Minister of Immigrant Absorption1970 1974Minister of Communications1970 1974Minister of Transportation1974 1977Minister of Information1974 1977Minister of Defense1984Minister of Internal Affairs1984Minister of Religious Affairs1986 1988Minister of Foreign Affairs1988 1990Minister of Finance1992 1995Minister of Foreign Affairs1995 1996Minister of Defense2001 2002Minister of Foreign AffairsMember of the KnessetIn office March 2006 13 June 2007November 1959 15 January 2006Personal detailsBornSzymon Perski 1923 08 02 2 August 1923Wiszniew Poland now Vishnyeva Belarus Died28 September 2016 2016 09 28 aged 93 Ramat Gan IsraelResting placeMount Herzl JerusalemNationalityIsraeliPolitical partyMapai 1959 1965 Rafi 1965 1968 Labor 1968 2005 Kadima 2005 2016 Other politicalaffiliationsAlignment 1965 1991 SpouseSonya Gelman m 1945 died 2011 wbr RelationsLauren Bacall cousin Uzi Peres nephew ChildrenTsviaYoniChemiAlma materThe New SchoolNew York UniversityHarvard UniversityAwardsNobel Peace Prize 1994 SignatureMilitary serviceAllegianceIsraelBranch serviceHaganahIsrael Defense Forcesa Acting 4 22 November 1995From a young age he was renowned for his oratorical brilliance and was chosen as a protege by David Ben Gurion Israel s founding father 6 He began his political career in the late 1940s holding several diplomatic and military positions during and directly after the 1948 Arab Israeli War His first high level government position was as deputy director general of defense in 1952 which he attained at the age of 28 and director general from 1953 until 1959 7 In 1956 he took part in the historic negotiations on the Protocol of Sevres 8 described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the highest form of statesmanship 9 In 1963 he held negotiations with U S President John F Kennedy which resulted in the sale of Hawk anti aircraft missiles to Israel the first sale of U S military equipment to Israel 10 Peres represented Mapai Rafi the Alignment Labor and Kadima in the Knesset and led Alignment and Labor 11 Peres first succeeded Yitzhak Rabin as acting prime minister briefly during 1977 before becoming prime minister from 1984 to 1986 As foreign minister under Prime Minister Rabin Peres engineered the 1994 Israel Jordan peace treaty 12 and won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize together with Rabin and Yasser Arafat for the Oslo Accords peace talks with the Palestinian leadership 7 In 1996 he founded the Peres Center for Peace which has the aim of promot ing lasting peace and advancement in the Middle East by fostering tolerance economic and technological development cooperation and well being 13 After suffering a stroke Peres died in 2016 near Tel Aviv 14 15 Contents 1 Early life 2 Director General of the Ministry of Defense 1953 1959 2 1 1956 Suez Crisis 3 Early Knesset career 1959 1974 4 Minister of Defense 1974 1977 4 1 1976 Entebbe rescue operation 4 2 Unsuccessful February 1977 campaign for Labor Party leader 5 Unofficial acting premiership 1977 6 Labor in opposition 1977 1984 7 Labor Likud grand coalition rotation government 1984 1988 7 1 First premiership 1984 1986 7 1 1 Military policy and international relations 7 1 2 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan 7 2 Minister of Foreign Affairs 1986 1988 8 Minister of Finance in a Likud led grand coalition government 1988 1990 9 Labor s return to the opposition 1990 1992 9 1 The dirty trick 9 2 Defeat in the 1992 Labor Party leadership election 10 Minister of Foreign Affairs in a Labor led government 1992 1995 10 1 Israel Jordan peace treaty 10 2 Oslo peace process with Palestine 11 Second premiership 1995 1996 12 Labor in opposition 1996 1999 13 Minister of Regional Cooperation in a Labor led government 1999 2001 14 Minister of Foreign Affairs in a Likud led grand coalition government 2001 2002 15 Labor in opposition 2002 2005 16 Vice Prime Minister in a Likud led grand coalition government 2005 17 Defeat in the 2005 Labor Party leadership election and departure from Labor Party to Kadima 18 Presidency 2007 2014 19 Post presidency and death 19 1 Tributes 19 2 Funeral 20 Political views 20 1 Technology 21 Personal life and family 21 1 Poetry and song writing 21 2 Use of social media 22 Places named after Peres 23 Published works 24 Awards and recognition 25 Overview of offices held 25 1 Labor Party leadership 25 2 Ministerial posts 25 3 Other offices 26 Electoral history 26 1 1996 direct election for Prime Minister 26 2 Presidential elections 26 3 Party leadership elections 27 See also 28 References 29 Further reading 30 External linksEarly lifeShimon Peres was born Szymon Perski on 2 August 1923 16 in Wiszniew Poland now Vishnyeva Belarus to Yitzhak 1896 1962 and Sara 1905 1969 nee Meltzer Perski 7 17 The family spoke Hebrew Yiddish and Russian at home and Peres learned Polish at school He then learned to speak English and French 18 His father was a wealthy timber merchant later branching out into other commodities his mother was a librarian Peres had a younger brother Gershon 19 He was related to the American film star Lauren Bacall born Betty Joan Perske and they were described as first cousins 20 but Peres said In 1952 or 1953 I came to New York Lauren Bacall called me said that she wanted to meet and we did We sat and talked about where our families came from and discovered that we were from the same family but I m not exactly sure what our relation is It was she who later said that she was my cousin I didn t say that 21 Shimon Peres standing third from right with his family ca 1930Peres told Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson that he had been born as a result of a blessing his parents had received from a chassidic rebbe and that he was proud of it 22 Peres s grandfather Rabbi Zvi Meltzer a grandson of Rabbi Chaim Volozhin had a great impact on his life In an interview Peres said As a child I grew up in my grandfather s home I was educated by him My grandfather taught me Talmud It was not as easy as it sounds My home was not an observant one My parents were not Orthodox but I was Haredi At one point I heard my parents listening to the radio on the Sabbath and I smashed it 23 When he was a child Peres was taken by his father to Radun to receive a blessing from Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan known as the Chofetz Chaim 24 As a child Peres would later say I did not dream of becoming president of Israel My dream as a boy was to be a shepherd or a poet of stars 25 He inherited his love of French literature from his maternal grandfather 26 In 1932 Peres s father immigrated to Mandatory Palestine and settled in Tel Aviv The family followed him in 1934 19 He attended Balfour Elementary School and High School and Geula Gymnasium High School for Commerce in Tel Aviv At 15 he transferred to Ben Shemen agricultural school and lived on Kibbutz Geva for several years 19 Peres was one of the founders of Kibbutz Alumot In 1941 he was elected Secretary of HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed a Labor Zionist youth movement and in 1944 returned to Alumot where he had an agricultural training and worked as a farmer and a shepherd 27 Peres at 13 years old in 1936 At age 20 he was elected to the HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed national secretariat where he was only one of two Mapai party supporters out of the 12 members Three years later he took over the movement and won a majority The head of Mapai David Ben Gurion and Berl Katznelson began to take an interest in him and appointed him to Mapai s secretariat 28 In 1944 Peres led an illicit expedition into the Negev then a closed military zone requiring a permit to enter The expedition consisting of a group of teenagers along with a Palmach scout a zoologist and an archaeologist had been funded by Ben Gurion and planned by Palmach head Yitzhak Sadeh as part of a plan for future Jewish settlement of the area so as to include it in the Jewish state 29 The group was arrested by a Bedouin camel patrol led by a British officer taken to Beersheba then a small Arab town and incarcerated in the local jail All of the participants were sentenced to two weeks in prison and as the leader Peres was also heavily fined 30 The expedition came across a nest of bearded vultures called peres in Hebrew and from this Peres took his Hebrew name 31 All of Peres s relatives who remained in Wiszniew in 1941 were murdered during the Holocaust 32 many of them including Rabbi Meltzer burned alive in the town s synagogue 33 In 1945 Peres married Sonya Gelman who preferred to remain outside the public eye They had three children 34 In 1946 Peres and Moshe Dayan were chosen as the two youth delegates in the Mapai delegation to the Zionist Congress in Basel 28 In 1947 Peres joined the Haganah the predecessor of the Israel Defense Forces David Ben Gurion made him responsible for personnel and arms purchases he was appointed to head the naval service when Israel received independence in 1948 29 Peres was director of the Defense Ministry s delegation in the United States in the early 1950s While in the U S he studied English economics and philosophy at The New School and New York University and completed a four month advanced management course at Harvard University 19 35 36 37 Director General of the Ministry of Defense 1953 1959 Peres center with Ezer Weizman and King Mahendra of Nepal in 1958 In 1952 Peres was appointed deputy director general of the Ministry of Defense and the following year he was promoted to director general 29 At age 29 he was the youngest person to hold this position 38 He was involved in arms purchases and establishing strategic alliances that were important for the State of Israel He was instrumental in establishing close relations with France securing massive amounts of quality arms that in turn helped to tip the balance of power in the region 39 In 1955 he testified against Minister of Defense Pinhas Lavon in what became known as the Lavon Affair citation needed Owing to Peres s mediation Israel acquired the advanced Dassault Mirage III French jet fighter established the Dimona nuclear reactor and entered into a tri national agreement with France and the United Kingdom positioning Israel in what would become the 1956 Suez Crisis Peres continued as a primary intermediary in the close French Israeli alliance from the mid 1950s 29 although from 1958 he was often involved in tense negotiations with Charles de Gaulle over the Dimona project 40 Peres is considered to have been the architect of Israel s secret nuclear weapons program in the 1960s and he stated that in the 1960s he recruited Arnon Milchan an Israeli American Hollywood film producer billionaire businessman and secret arms dealer and intelligence operative to work for the Israeli Bureau of Scientific Relations LEKEM or LAKAM a secret intelligence organization tasked with obtaining military technology and science espionage 41 1956 Suez Crisis Main article Suez Crisis From 1954 as director general of the Ministry of Defense Peres was involved in the planning of the 1956 Suez War in partnership with France and Britain Peres was sent by David Ben Gurion to Paris where he held secret meetings with the French government 42 Peres was instrumental in negotiating the Franco Israeli agreement for a military offensive 43 In November 1954 Peres visited Paris where he was received by the French Defense Minister Marie Pierre Kœnig who told him that France would sell Israel any weapons it wanted to buy 44 By early 1955 France was shipping large amounts of weapons to Israel 44 In April 1956 following another visit to Paris by Peres France agreed to disregard the Tripartite Declaration and supply more weapons to Israel 45 During the same visit Peres informed the French that Israel had decided upon war with Egypt in 1956 46 Throughout the 1950s an extraordinarily close relationship existed between France and Israel characterised by unprecedented cooperation in the fields of defense and diplomacy For his work as the architect of this relationship Peres was awarded the highest order of the French the Legion of Honor as Commander 38 47 At Sevres Peres took part in planning alongside Maurice Bourges Maunoury Christian Pineau and Chief of Staff of the French Armed Forces General Maurice Challe and British Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd and his assistant Sir Patrick Dean 8 Britain and France enlisted Israeli support for an alliance against Egypt The parties agreed that Israel would invade the Sinai Britain and France would then intervene purportedly to separate the warring Israeli and Egyptian forces instructing both to withdraw to a distance of 16 kilometres from either side of the canal 48 The British and French would then argue according to the plan that Egypt s control of such an important route was too tenuous and that it needed be placed under Anglo French management The agreement at Sevres was initially described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the highest form of statesmanship 9 The three allies especially Israel were mainly successful in attaining their immediate military objectives However the extremely hostile reaction to the Suez Crisis from both the United States and the USSR forced them to withdraw resulting in a failure of Britain and France s political and strategic aims of controlling the Suez Canal Early Knesset career 1959 1974 Shimon Peres with Yitzak Rabin and Levi Eshkol in 1964 Peres was first elected to the Knesset in the 1959 elections 49 29 as a member of the Mapai party 38 He was given the role of deputy minister of defense which he filled until 1965 holding this position in the 9th 10th 11th and 12th governments of Israel under Prime Ministers David Ben Gurion and Levi Eshkol 38 In this position he held negotiations with John F Kennedy which concluded with the sale of Hawk anti aircraft missiles to Israel the first sale of US military equipment to Israel 10 Peres resigned from the 12th government in late May 1965 citing the growing rift between Prime Minister Eshkol and former prime minister Ben Gurion Peres was aligned with Ben Gurion 50 51 In 1965 Peres and Moshe Dayan were among those that left Mapai with David Ben Gurion when Ben Gurion formed a new party Rafi 38 Peres was a co founder of the Rafi party 52 The party reconciled with Mapai in 1968 merging to form the Israeli Labor Party The Labor Party then joined the Alignment a left wing alliance 38 In 1969 Peres was appointed minister of immigrant absorption in the 15th government led by Prime Minister Golda Meir and in 1970 also in the 15th government he became minister of transportation and communications 38 After this he served as minister of information in the Meir led 16th government 29 38 Minister of Defense 1974 1977 Peres was appointed minister of defense in the Yitzhak Rabin led 17th government after having been Rabin s chief rival for the post of Labor Party leader and in effect the Israeli premiership in the 1974 Israeli Labor Party leadership election that was held after Golda Meir resigned in the aftermath of the Yom Kippur War 29 38 1976 Entebbe rescue operation Main article Operation Entebbe On 27 June 1976 Peres as minister of defense in collaboration with Prime Minister Rabin handled Israel s response to a coordinated act of terrorism when 248 Paris bound travelers on an Air France plane were taken hostage by pro Palestinian hijackers and flown to Uganda Africa 2 000 miles away Peres and Rabin were responsible for approving what became known as the Operation Entebbe which took place on 4 July 1976 The rescue boosted the Rabin government s approval rating with the public 53 The only Israeli soldier that was killed during the successful rescue operation was its commander 30 year old Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Netanyahu older brother of Benjamin Netanyahu 54 Before Rabin ultimately approved the rescue mission he and Peres were at odds on how to proceed Rabin was open to acquiescing to the terrorists demands to release forty Palestinian militants if no military option presented itself Peres however felt acquiescing to be a nonstarter believing it would encourage further terrorism 55 Rabin initially took steps to begin negotiations with the terrorists seeing no other option Peres felt that negotiating with terrorists would in effect be a surrender and thought a rescue operation should be planned 56 Peres organized a secret Israel Crisis Committee to come up with a rescue plan When a plan had been made he met with commander Netanyahu a number of times 57 During one of their final private meetings they both examined maps and went over precise details Peres later said of Netanyahu s explanation My impression was one of exactitude and imagination saying that Netanyahu seemed confident the operation would succeed with almost no losses 57 Netanyahu left the meeting understanding that Peres would do everything in his power to see that the operation went smoothly 57 Peres then went unannounced to Moshe Dayan the former minister of Ddfense interrupting his dinner with friends in a restaurant to show him the latest plan to get his opinion Peres told Dayan of the objections that had been raised by Rabin and Chief of Staff Mordechai Gur Dayan dismissed the objections after reviewing the written details Shimon he said this is a plan that I support not one hundred percent but one hundred and fifty percent There has to be a military operation 56 Peres later got the approval from Gur who became fully supportive 56 Peres then took the plan to Rabin who had been lukewarm and still didn t like the risks but he reluctantly approved the plan after Peres answered a number of key questions and Rabin learned that the cabinet had also endorsed it 58 Shortly after the mission ended Rabin recounted we called into my office seven of our top commanders I told our friends in uniform that the honor of the Jewish people their destinies are challenged and what we are considering is not just a calculated risk in the military sense but a comparative risk which exists between surrender to terror and daring rescue stemming from independence 59 After the success of the operation Peres angled to receive some of the credit and adulation somewhat competing with Rabin for credit 59 Unsuccessful February 1977 campaign for Labor Party leader Main article February 1977 Israeli Labor Party leadership election In February 1977 Peres challenged Prime Minister Rabin for the leadership of Labor Party but lost to Rabin in a narrow 50 72 to 49 28 result in the vote by the party s Central Committee 60 29 61 62 The leadership election was expected to determine who would lead the party into the 1977 Knesset election This was at moment when Labor was threatened with the prospect of losing its control of government after 28 consecutive years due to the rise of both the right wing Likud bloc and the centrist Democratic Movement for Change which were seen as collectively cutting into the Labor Party s support in the upcoming election At the time Rabin and Peres presented little policy difference with Peres being seen as only slightly to the right of Rabin on domestic matters Instead of positioning himself in contrast to the incumbent Rabin on policy Peres instead capitalized off of the political atmosphere and staked his candidacy largely on an argument that the Labor Party needed to satisfy the nation s desire for change by choosing a new leader for itself 61 Unofficial acting premiership 1977 On 8 April 1977 Prime Minister Rabin announced that in the wake of a foreign currency scandal involving his wife he would be stepping down prior to the 1977 Knesset election 63 Peres made himself a candidate to replace him as the new Labor Party leader Initially Foreign Minister Yigal Allon also made himself a candidate However Allon and Peres reached an agreement that Peres would appoint Allon to any ministerial position that Allon preferred in exchange from his withdrawal of his candidacy Following Allon s withdrawal the Labor Party leadership announced on 10 April 1977 that they had chosen to endorse Peres as the party s new leader On 11 April 1977 the 815 member Central Committee of the party elected Peres by acclamation as the party s new leader 60 64 65 Rabin ended his active service as prime minister on 22 April 1977 and Peres became Israel s unofficial acting prime minister The reason why Peres was not officially the holder of this office was that Rabin could not under Israeli law resign from his position as prime minister because the government was at the time a caretaker government 38 66 67 68 69 In his first election as party leader Peres led Labor Party and the Alignment coalition to its first ever electoral defeat and the result afforded the first place Likud party led by Menachem Begin the ability to form a coalition that excluded the left When the new Likud led government was formed on 20 June 1977 70 Peres time as the unofficial acting prime minister ended Labor in opposition 1977 1984 Once the Likud led government took power Labor and the Alignment bloc entered the Knesset opposition for the first time in its history 71 and Peres assumed the unofficial role of Knesset opposition leader 52 In 1978 Peres was elected vice president of Socialist International 72 Through his role within the leadership of this organization Peres befriended foreign politicians including Willy Brandt Bruno Kreisky members of the British Labour Party and politicians from parts of Africa and Asia 73 After handily winning reelection as Labor Party leader in 1980 defeating a challenge from Rabin who was attempting a comeback to the leadership 60 Peres led his party to another narrower loss in the 1981 elections Labor Likud grand coalition rotation government 1984 1988 In the 1984 elections Peres third election as Labor Party leader the Alignment coalition won more seats than any other party but the left wing failed to win the majority of 61 seats needed to form a coalition on their own Alignment and Likud agreed to an unusual rotation arrangement to form a grand coalition unity government during which for the first twenty five months Peres would serve as prime minister and the Likud leader Yitzhak Shamir would be foreign minister with the two swapping positions thereafter for the second half of the term 29 38 74 First premiership 1984 1986 See also Twenty first government of Israel Prime Minister Peres delivers a speech in front of Ethiopian Jewish immigrants 2 October 1985 Peres was regarded to be a popular prime minister in his two years as premier under the rotation arrangement 75 During a portion of his premiership he also held the position of minister of religious affairs 52 Military policy and international relations Among the most noteworthy moments of his first tenure as prime minister was Operation Wooden Leg a long range Israeli airstrike against the PLO headquarters in Tunisia and a trip to Morocco to confer with King Hassan II 76 77 In 1985 Peres publicly supported the quick pursuit of a military pullback from Beirut to Israel s south Lebanon security belt 78 A partial Israeli pullback had earlier been approved in 1983 by the Begin headed Likud led government that had been in power at that time 79 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan Main article 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan A major domestic policy decision of Peres first premiership was the implementation of the 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan By 1985 Israel s economic fortunes were looking dire with immense and quickly rising inflation Israel was experiencing hyperinflation a government budget deficit equal to between twelve and fifteen percent of the nation s GDP and national debt equal to 220 of the nation s GDP and Israel s foreign currency reserves were quickly dissipating 80 With the assistance of the government of the United States Peres assembled a board of American economist to advise him on the situation Conditional on him implementing reforms Peres secured emergency economic assistance from the United States of 750 million equivalent to 3 5 of the nation s GDP at the time annually over a two year period 81 Peres was initially hesitant to take the drastic measures that he ultimately would pursue as they had the strong potential of proving unpopular and came with a risk of potentially creating a drastic increase in unemployment 81 Peres ultimately was convinced to push through the 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan Once convinced he was assertive in pushing for the passage of the program which was quickly after approved by his cabinet on 1 July 1985 This program had quick success in improving the course of the Israeli economy By the end of the year inflation immensely decreased Additionally the shekel stabilized and the government balanced its budget While Israel would subsequently slide into a recession the stabilization has been regarded as an important and greatly successful model for addressing economies in crisis and has been credited with saving the nation s economy 80 81 82 Minister of Foreign Affairs 1986 1988 As per the rotation arrangement after Peres two years as prime minister he and Shamir traded places in 1986 with Shamir becoming prime minister of the new twenty second government of Israel and Peres becoming foreign minister During this government Peres was the designated acting prime minister of Israel Minister of Finance in a Likud led grand coalition government 1988 1990 In 1988 the Alignment led by Peres suffered another narrow defeat This came despite the fact that polling in 1988 showed Peres to be the most popular politician in the nation 83 Peres agreed to renew the grand coalition with the Likud this time conceding the premiership to Shamir for the entire term In the grand coalition unity government of 1988 90 the twenty third government of Israel Peres served as minister of finance and also continued to be the designated acting prime minister of Israel Labor s return to the opposition 1990 1992 The dirty trick Peres and the Alignment finally left the government in 1990 after the dirty trick a failed bid by Peres to form a narrow government based on a coalition of the Alignment small leftist factions and ultra orthodox parties 84 Peres hope had been to create a Labor led government that would be focused on peace talks with Palestine Likud had declined proposals by the United States for Israel and Palestine to initiate what would have been the first peace talks between the two sides Peres longtime intra party rival Yizhak Rabin had opposed to overthrowing the Likud led coalition government 75 Peres succeeded in ending the government twenty third government with a vote of no confidence 74 However Peres was subsequently unable to assemble enough Knesset partners to form a pro peace talk government 75 After two months Shamir managed to form a Likud led government with right wing religious parties establishing what was seen as the most conservative government coalition in the history of Israel up to that point 74 75 Defeat in the 1992 Labor Party leadership election Peres led the opposition in the Knesset from 1990 until early 1992 when he was defeated by Yitzhak Rabin in the Israeli Labor Party leadership election the first leadership election held since the party formally merged with the other parties of Alignment and the first leadership election open to participation by the party s entire membership 29 60 Peres remained active in politics however 29 Minister of Foreign Affairs in a Labor led government 1992 1995 After the Labor Party was successful in the 1992 Knesset election and Rabin became prime minister again Rabin made Peres foreign minister in his government 29 Peres had previously served as foreign minister from 1986 through 1988 Israel Jordan peace treaty Shimon Peres left with Yitzhak Rabin center and King Hussein of Jordan right prior to signing the Israel Jordan peace treaty On 26 October 1994 Jordan and Israel signed the Israel Jordan peace treaty 12 which had been initiated by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres The ceremony was held in the Arava valley of Israel north of Eilat and near the Jordanian border Prime Minister Rabin and Prime Minister Abdelsalam al Majali signed the treaty and the President of Israel Ezer Weizman shook hands with King Hussein United States President Bill Clinton observed accompanied by United States Secretary of State Warren Christopher as well as the foreign ministers of eleven other nations including Russia which had joined the United States as a formal co sponsor of the peace talks that led to the treaty The treaty brought an end to 46 years of official war between Israel and Jordan It was only the second full peace agreement that Israel had reached with an Arab nation after the Camp David Accords signed with Egypt in 1978 85 Oslo peace process with Palestine Main article Oslo Accords Peres signing Oslo I on 13 September 1993 Rabin s 1992 campaign for Labor had primarily been run on the idea of negotiating peace with the Palestinians This campaign had succeeded as a peaceful resolution to the Israeli Palestinian conflict was popular among the Israeli public at the time The twenty fifth government of Israel was arguably more pro peace government than any previous Israeli government 74 Rabin s government would begin negotiations with the Yasser Arafat led Palestinian Liberation Organization PLO Peres was involved in secret peace negotiations between Prime Minister Rabin s government and Arafat s PLO organization These negotiations were held over several months in 1992 and 1993 As part of the negotiations Peres secretly flew to Oslo Norway on 19 August 1993 The ultimate agreement outlined a peace process between Israel and Palestine which would include the establishment of an interim Palestinian government within both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank On 13 September 1993 Peres signed the initial Oslo I Accord on behalf of the Israeli government at in a ceremony at the United States White House with Rabin in attendance 86 Yitzhak Rabin Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat receiving the Nobel Peace Prize following the Oslo Accords In 1994 in recognition of the Oslo Accords Peres Rabin and Arafat were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 86 This was the second and most recent instance in which an Israeli was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize Then Prime Minister Menachem Begin had previously jointly received the honor with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in 1978 This was also the second time that the award had been given in recognition of middle east peacemaking efforts with the 1978 award having been the previous instance of this 87 The awarding of the prize to the three has not been without controversy After it was decided they would be given the award Kare Kristiansen resigned from the Nobel Peace Prize committee in protest of Arafat receiving the award believing Arafat to be too tainted by violence terror and torture 87 In 2002 a number of members of the Norwegian committee that awards the annual Nobel Peace Prize would state they regretted that Mr Peres s prize could not be recalled Because he had not acted to prevent Israel s re occupation of Palestinian territory he had not lived up to the ideals he expressed when he accepted the prize and he was involved in human rights abuses 88 Negotiations on further terms continued with Peres continuing to be an integral player 89 90 On 28 September 1995 Rabin and Arafat jointly signed a second major agreement which has popularly been referred to as Oslo II 86 89 Second premiership 1995 1996 See also Twenty fifth government of Israel and Twenty sixth government of Israel Peres far left and Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin far right during the 4 November 1995 peace rally at which Rabin was assassinated Shimon Peres with U S President Bill Clinton at the White House April 1996 While the Oslo peace policies at the time enjoyed the support of most Israelis they also faced intense opposition from extreme members of Israel s right wing 74 In response to intense street protests by right wing opponents of the Oslo peace process a coalition of left wing parties and peace groups organized a rally in support of the peace process in Tel Aviv s Kings Square on 4 November 1995 which both Prime Minister Rabin and Peres attended While making his way from the stage to his car after concluding his speech to the gathered crowd of more than 100 000 people Rabin was assassinated by Yigal Amir a right wing Israeli Jew who opposed the peace process 86 91 92 93 94 After Rabin s assassination Peres was made acting prime minister and acting defense minister of a provisional government 38 92 95 On 14 November 1995 the Labor Party confirmed Peres as its new leader which thereby cleared the last formality before he could be invited by President Ezer Weizman to form a new government 60 96 On 15 November 1995 Peres was invited by to form a new government On 21 November Peres signed a coalition agreement between Labor Meretz and Yiud which had been members of Rabin s government which was formally approved by the Knesset the next day establishing a new government with Peres as prime minister 95 Peres second stint as prime minister both acting and official ultimately lasted a total of seven months During this time Peres attempted to maintain the momentum of the peace process 38 On 10 February 1996 Peres made the widely expected announcement that he would call early elections moving the elections to late May five months earlier than they otherwise were to be held The election would be the first to use a new system in which the prime minister was directly elected in a vote coinciding with the Knesset election 94 Peres had hoped that early elections would deliver a mandate for his pursuit of a two state solution 97 Peres had called the elections early because of promising polls 94 Peres was heavily leading in the polls for the prime minister vote at the time the election was called with polls showing him to have between a twenty and twenty five percent lead 52 94 Additionally Labor was also leading in polls for the Knesset vote Despite the promising polls however some in Labor had even at this time expressed concerns about the ability of Peres to win given his failure to deliver an outright win for the Labor Party during his earlier stint as party leader 94 Peres lead in the polls began to decrease after the Jaffa Road bus bombings on 25 February 1996 However even in the last month before the election Peres enjoyed a smaller lead of around five percent 52 On 11 April 1996 Prime Minister Peres initiated Operation Grapes of Wrath 98 which was triggered by Hezbollah Katyusha rockets fired into Israel in response to the killing of two Lebanese by an IDF missile Israel conducted massive air raids and extensive shelling in southern Lebanon 106 Lebanese civilians died in the shelling of Qana when a UN compound was hit in an Israeli shelling 99 In 1996 Peres founded the Peres Center for Peace which has the aim of promot ing lasting peace and advancement in the Middle East by fostering tolerance economic and technological development cooperation and well being 13 During his term Peres promoted the use of the internet in Israel and created the first website of an Israeli prime minister 100 Labor in opposition 1996 1999 Peres was narrowly defeated by Benjamin Netanyahu in the 1996 Israeli prime ministerial election Not included in the new government Labor became an opposition party again once again placing Peres in the then unofficial role of Knesset opposition leader Peres did not seek re election as Labor Party leader in 1997 100 and was replaced by Ehud Barak that year 101 Barak rebuffed Peres attempt to secure the position of party president 100 Minister of Regional Cooperation in a Labor led government 1999 2001 Ehud Barak was elected prime minister and formed a government in 1999 Barak appointed Peres who was seen as a political rival of the new prime minister to the minor post of minister of regional cooperation 100 102 The position was vaguely defined being expected to be tasked with advancing economic and political ties between Israel and the Arab world 103 102 The position also did not come with any government funding 102 Peres accepted the relatively low ranked position reluctantly 103 For nearly all of time in this position Peres was not given a major role in the government 104 On 1 November 2000 amid the Second Intifada Peres met in the Gaza Strip with Arafat on behalf of the Israeli government and the two agreed to terms of a truce in the early hours of the next morning 105 106 107 108 109 After the resignation of Ezer Weizman Peres ran in the 2000 Israeli presidential election seeking to be elected by members of the Knesset to a seven year term as Israel s president a ceremonial head of state position which usually authorizes the selection of Prime Minister However he lost to Likud candidate Moshe Katsav Katsav s victory was attributed in part to evidence that Peres planned to use the position to support the increasingly unpopular peace processes of the government of Ehud Barak 110 Peres defeat was considered a significant upset as he had been thought to be heavily favored to win the Knesset vote 111 The editorial board of the Los Angeles Times wrote that his defeat appeared to be the end of Peres distinguished political career 112 There was consideration given later that year to Peres potentially seeking the premiership again On 20 November 2000 amid polls showing him to be in a virtual tie with Ariel Sharon an aide of Peres told the media that he would run in the 2001 direct election for prime minister Peres himself told lawmakers that he intended to run 113 Despite this Peres did not become a candidate 114 In January 2001 there was some talk among Cabinet members that it would be best for Peres to be the candidate of the left 104 115 However this did not happen In early January 2001 in a joint television appearance with the incumbent prime minister that promoted the government s intent to work towards peace Peres told the media that his own goal was not to become prime minister but was instead to do the best for the state of Israel 104 Minister of Foreign Affairs in a Likud led grand coalition government 2001 2002 Following Ehud Barak s defeat by Ariel Sharon in the 2001 direct election for prime minister Peres made yet another comeback He led helped Labor into a grand coalition unity government with Sharon s Likud the Twenty ninth government of Israel and secured the post of foreign minister 38 The formal leadership of the party passed to Binyamin Ben Eliezer and in 2002 to Mayor of Haifa Amram Mitzna Peres was much criticized on the left for clinging to his position as foreign minister in a government that was not seen as advancing the peace process despite his own dovish stance He left this office only when Labor resigned from the government in advance of the 2003 Knesset election 38 Labor in opposition 2002 2005 Peres left his post as foreign minister following Labor s 2002 exit from the unity government Labor s departure from the unity government had placed Labor in the opposition After the Labor Party suffered a crushing defeat in the 2003 Knesset election while under the leadership of Mitzna Peres was made interim leader of the party on 19 June 2003 116 Vice Prime Minister in a Likud led grand coalition government 2005 Peres led the Labor Party into a coalition with Sharon once more reaching an agreement the end of 2004 and entering the party into the thirtieth government of Israel in January 2005 This came after the Sharon s support of disengagement from Gaza presented a diplomatic program that Labor could support 38 Sharon made Peres vice prime minister Peres in 2005 As interim party leader Peres favored putting off the elections for as long as possible He claimed that an early election would jeopardize both the September 2005 Gaza withdrawal plan and the standing of the party in a national unity government with Sharon However the majority pushed for an earlier date as younger members of the party among them Amir Peretz Ophir Pines Paz and Isaac Herzog overtook established leaders such as Binyamin Ben Eliezer and Haim Ramon in the party ballot to divide up government portfolios 117 Defeat in the 2005 Labor Party leadership election and departure from Labor Party to KadimaPeres lost a bid for permanent leadership of the Labor Party to Amir Peretz in the November 2005 leadership election held in advance of the 2006 elections 117 118 Peres received 40 of the vote to Peretz s 42 4 117 Labor withdrew from the unity government on 23 November 2005 119 On 30 November 2005 Peres announced that he was leaving the Labor Party to support Ariel Sharon and his new Kadima party 38 In the immediate aftermath of Sharon s debilitating stroke days later which left Sharon in a coma there was speculation that Peres might take over as leader of the Kadima party most senior Kadima leaders however were former members of Likud and indicated their support for Ehud Olmert as Sharon s successor 120 Labor reportedly tried to woo Peres to rejoin them 121 However he announced that he supported Olmert and would remain with Kadima Peres had previously announced his intention not to run in the March 2006 elections but changed his mind 38 Peres resigned from the Knesset on 15 January 2006 due both to Attorney General Menahem Mazuz issuing a decision that ruled Peres and several others could not be appointed to ministerial posts by Prime Minister Olmert 122 and because of a law that due to him having switched parties would have prevented him from running for the next Knesset if he remained an incumbent member of the Knesset 123 By that time he had served in the Knesset for more than forty six consecutive years Peres was soon elected back to the Knesset in the 2006 election this time as a member of Kadima After the new Kadima led government was formed Peres was given the role of vice prime minister and minister for the development of the Negev Galilee and Regional Economy 38 Presidency 2007 2014 Main article Presidency of Shimon Peres source source Shimon Peres in December 2007 audio Shimon Peres at the World Economic Forum on the Middle East 2009 Shimon Peres meeting with U S President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in the Oval Office 5 May 2009 Shimon Peres and the Foreign Minister of Brazil Celso Amorim meet in Brasilia 11 November 2009 Shimon Peres addressing a gathering of the World Jewish Congress in Jerusalem 2010 On 13 June 2007 Peres was elected president of the State of Israel by the Knesset 58 of 120 members of the Knesset voted for him in the first round whereas 38 voted for Reuven Rivlin and 21 for Colette Avital His opponents then backed Peres in the second round and 86 members of the Knesset voted in his favor 124 while 23 objected He resigned from his role as a member of the Knesset the same day having been a member since November 1959 except for a three month period in early 2006 the longest serving in Israeli political history Peres was sworn in as president on 15 July 2007 125 Israel must not only be an asset but a value A moral cultural and scientific call for the promotion of man every man It must be a good and warm home for Jews who are not Israelis as well as for Israelis who are not Jews And it must create equal opportunities for all without discriminating between religion nationality community or sex I have seen Israel in its most difficult hours and also in moments of achievement and spiritual uplifting My years place me at an observation point from which can be viewed the scene of our reviving nation spread out in all its glory Permit me to remain an optimist Permit me to be a dreamer of his people If sometimes the atmosphere is autumnal and also if today the day seems suddenly grey the president Israel has chosen will never tire of encouraging awakening and reminding because spring is waiting for us The spring will definitely come Shimon Peres President s inaugural address July 2007 25 On 20 November 2008 Peres received an honorary knighthood Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George from Queen Elizabeth II in Buckingham Palace in London 126 In June 2011 he was awarded the honorary title of sheikh by Bedouin dignitaries in Hura for his efforts to achieve Middle East peace Peres thanks his hosts by saying This visit has been a pleasure I am deeply impressed by Hura You have done more for yourselves than anyone else could have He told the Mayor of Hura Dr Muhammad Al Nabari and members of Hura s governing council that they were part of the Negev It cannot be developed without developing the Bedouin community so that it may keep its traditions while joining the modern world 127 Post presidency and deathPeres announced in April 2013 that he would not seek to extend his tenure beyond 2014 His successor Reuven Rivlin was elected on 10 June 2014 and took office on 24 July 2014 In July 2016 Peres founded the Israel innovation center in the Arab neighbourhood of Ajami Jaffa aiming to encourage young people from around the world to be inspired by technology 128 On 13 September 2016 Peres suffered a severe stroke and was hospitalized at Sheba Medical Center His condition was reported to be very serious as he had suffered a massive brain hemorrhage and significant bleeding 129 Two days later he was reported as being in a serious but stable condition 130 However on 26 September an examination found irreversible damage to his brainstem indicating that it was not possible for him to recover and the following day his medical condition deteriorated significantly 131 He died on 28 September at the age of 93 132 133 Tributes On hearing of his death tributes came from leaders across the world The President of Russia Vladimir Putin said I was extremely lucky to have met this extraordinary man many times And every time I admired his courage patriotism wisdom vision and ability 134 The President of China Xi Jinping said His death is the loss of an old friend for China 135 The President of India Pranab Mukherjee said Peres would be remembered as a steadfast friend of India 136 The President of the United States Barack Obama said I will always be grateful that I was able to call Shimon my friend Peres was described by The New York Times as having done more than anyone to build up his country s formidable military might then having worked as hard to establish a lasting peace with Israel s Arab neighbors 29 Funeral Peres s grave on the Great Leaders of the Nation section of Mount Herzl The funeral was held at Mount Herzl in Jerusalem on 30 September 2016 with his burial place in the Great Leaders of the Nation section between former Israeli Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin and Yitzhak Shamir 137 138 About 4 000 mourners and world leaders from 75 countries attended the funeral with President Barack Obama among those who gave a eulogy 139 140 Since the funeral for Nelson Mandela this was only the second time Obama traveled overseas for the funeral of a foreign leader 141 Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also spoke 142 143 Among the other delegates in attendance and speaking were former President Bill Clinton 144 145 Other delegates included PA President Mahmoud Abbas President Francois Hollande of France Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada German President Joachim Gauck President Enrique Pena Nieto of Mexico and King Felipe VI of Spain 141 The UK delegation included Prince Charles Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson former Prime Ministers David Cameron Gordon Brown and Tony Blair and Britain s chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis Political viewsPeres described himself as a Ben Gurionist after his mentor Ben Gurion 146 He felt that Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel was a means to a progressive end in which the State of Israel both inspire the world and survive in a region of the world where it was unwelcome 147 As a younger man Peres was once considered a hawk 148 He was a protege of Ben Gurion and Dayan and an early supporter of the West Bank settlers during the 1970s However after becoming the leader of his party his stance evolved Subsequently he was seen as a dove and a strong supporter of peace through economic cooperation While still opposed like all mainstream Israeli leaders in the 1970s and early 1980s to talks with the PLO he distanced himself from settlers and spoke of the need for territorial compromise over the West Bank and Gaza For a time he hoped that King Hussein of Jordan could be Israel s Arab negotiating partner rather than Yasser Arafat Peres met secretly with Hussein in London in 1987 and reached a framework agreement with him but this was rejected by Israel s then Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir Shortly afterward the First Intifada erupted and whatever plausibility King Hussein had as a potential Israeli partner in resolving the fate of the West Bank evaporated Subsequently Peres gradually moved closer to support for talks with the PLO although he avoided making an outright commitment to this policy until 1993 Peres was perhaps more closely associated with the Oslo Accords than any other Israeli politician Rabin included with the possible exception of his own protege Yossi Beilin He remained an adamant supporter of the Oslo Accords and the Palestinian Authority since their inception despite the First Intifada and the al Aqsa Intifada Second Intifada However Peres supported Ariel Sharon s military policy of operating the Israeli Defense Forces to thwart suicide bombings Peres s foreign policy outlook was markedly realist To placate Turkey 149 Peres downplayed the Armenian genocide 150 Peres stated We reject attempts to create a similarity between the Holocaust and the Armenian allegations Nothing similar to the Holocaust occurred It is a tragedy what the Armenians went through but not a genocide 151 152 153 Although Peres himself did not retract the statement the Israeli Foreign Ministry later issued a cable to its missions which stated that The minister absolutely did not say as the Turkish news agency alleged What the Armenians underwent was a tragedy not a genocide 150 However according to Armenian news agencies the statement released by the Israeli consulate in Los Angeles did not include any mention that Peres had not said that the events were not genocide 150 On the issue of the nuclear program of Iran and the supposed existential threat this poses for Israel Peres stated I am not in favor of a military attack on Iran but we must quickly and decisively establish a strong aggressive coalition of nations that will impose painful economic sanctions on Iran adding Iran s efforts to achieve nuclear weapons should keep the entire world from sleeping soundly In the same speech Peres compared Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his call to wipe Israel off the map to the genocidal threats to European Jewry made by Adolf Hitler in the years prior to the Holocaust 154 In an interview with Army Radio on 8 May 2006 he remarked that the president of Iran should remember that Iran can also be wiped off the map 155 However after his death it was revealed that Peres had said that he prevented a military strike on Iran s nuclear program that had been ordered by Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak in 2010 156 Peres was a proponent of Middle East economic integration 157 Technology Peres is regarded as one of the founders of Israel s technology sector Through personal meetings with the French government he established collaboration treaties with France s nuclear industry in 1954 In 1958 he founded the re organized RAFAEL Armament Development Authority 158 under the MOD s jurisdiction From his desk he would control all aspects of Israel s nuclear program first as director general and after 1959 as deputy mnister 159 In the 1980s he is credited with having laid the economic foundations for Israel s start up economy 160 In later years he developed an obsessive fascination with nanotechnology and brain research 161 He believed that brain research would be the key to a better and more peaceful future 162 He launched his own nanotechnology investment fund in 2003 raising 5 million in the first week 163 In 2016 he founded the Israel innovation center in the Arab neighbourhood of Ajami Jaffa The center aims to encourage young people from around the world to be inspired by technology Laying its foundation stone on 21 July 2016 Peres said We will prove that innovation has no limits and no barriers Innovation enables dialogue between nations and between people It will enable all young people Jews Muslims and Christians to engage in science and technology equally 164 Personal life and familyIn May 1945 Peres married Sonya Gelman whom he had met in the Ben Shemen Youth Village where her father served as a carpentry teacher The couple married after Sonya finished her military service as a truck driver in the British Army during World War II Through the years Sonya chose to stay away from the media and keep her privacy and the privacy of her family despite her husband s extensive political career 165 Sonya Peres was unable to attend Shimon s 2007 presidential inauguration ceremony because of ill health 34 With the election of Peres for president Sonya Peres who had not wanted her husband to accept the position announced that she would stay in the couple s apartment in Tel Aviv and not join her husband in Jerusalem The couple thereafter lived separately 165 She died on 20 January 2011 aged 87 from heart failure at her apartment in Tel Aviv 166 Shimon and Sonya Peres had three children Their eldest child was a daughter Dr Tsvia Tsiki Walden who became a linguist and professor at Beit Berl Academic College Their middle child was a son Yoni who became director of Village Veterinary Center a veterinary hospital on the campus of Kfar Hayarok Agricultural School near Tel Aviv He specializes in the treatment of guide dogs Their youngest child Nehemia Chemi became co founder and managing general partner of Pitango Venture Capital one of Israel s largest venture capital funds 167 Chemi Peres is a former helicopter pilot in the IAF Peres was a cousin of actress Lauren Bacall born Betty Joan Persky although the two only discovered their relation to each other in the 1950s Recalling this Peres once remarked In 1952 or 1953 I came to New York Lauren Bacall called me said that she wanted to meet and we did We sat and talked about where our families came from and discovered that we were from the same family 168 Peres was a polyglot speaking Polish French English Russian Yiddish and Hebrew He never lost his Polish accent when speaking in Hebrew 26 Poetry and song writing Peres was a lifelong writer of poetry and songs As a child in Vishnyeva Poland he learned to play the mandolin 169 He wrote his first song when he was 8 He was inspired to write including during cabinet meetings 170 Peres was noted to sometimes write stanzas during Cabinet meetings 170 As a result of his deep literary interests he could quote from Hebrew prophets French literature and Chinese philosophy with equal ease 26 Many of his poems were turned into songs with the proceedings of the albums going to charity 170 His songs have been performed by artists including Andrea Bocelli and Liel Kolet 171 The most recent of his songs was Chinese Melody recorded in Mandarin with Chinese and Israeli musicians released in February 2016 which he wrote to celebrate the Year of the Monkey Music Video of Chinese Melody on YouTube 172 Use of social media During his presidency 2007 2014 Shimon Peres was noted for his embrace of social media to communicate with the public being described as Israel s first social media president 173 which included producing comedic videos on his YouTube channel such as Be my Friend for Peace 173 and Former Israeli President Shimon Peres Goes Job Hunting 173 After retirement he led a viral campaign to encourage children to study mathematics In one video he sends his answer to the teacher by throwing a paper plane Video Shimon Peres throws a paper airplane in the name of education on YouTube 174 According to The Wall Street Journal his presence on platforms such as Snapchat allowed him to pack more punch and humor into the causes he championed especially peaceful coexistence with the Palestinians 175 Places named after PeresFollowing his death it was announced that Israel s Negev nuclear reactor and atomic research center that had been constructed in 1958 would be named after Peres Netanyahu stated Shimon Peres worked hard to establish this important facility a facility which has been very important for Israel s security for generations 176 Published works Peres at the 65th Anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising ceremony with Polish president Lech Kaczynski 2008 Shimon Peres is the author of 11 books including The Next Step 1965 David s Sling 1970 ISBN 0 297 00083 7 And Now Tomorrow 1978 From These Men seven founders of the State of Israel 1979 ISBN 0 671 61016 3 Entebbe Diary 1991 ISBN 965 248 111 4 The New Middle East 1993 ISBN 0 8050 3323 8 Battling for Peace A Memoir 1995 ISBN 0 679 43617 0 For the Future of Israel 1998 ISBN 0 8018 5928 X The Imaginary Voyage With Theodor Herzl in Israel 1999 ISBN 1 55970 468 3 Ben Gurion A Political Life 2011 ISBN 978 0 8052 4282 9 Awards and recognition1957 Commander of the Legion of Honour 47 1994 10 December Nobel Peace Prize together with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat 7 2008 18 November Honorary doctorate of law from King s College London 177 2008 20 November Honorarily appointed Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George 178 2012 13 June Presidential Medal of Freedom from US President Barack Obama 179 2014 19 May The United States House of Representatives voted on H R 2939 a bill to award Peres the Congressional Gold Medal 179 The bill said that Congress proclaims its unbreakable bond with Israel 180 2015 31 May The Solomon Bublick Award of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in recognition of his contributions to the State of Israel the pursuit of peace higher education and science and technology 181 Overview of offices heldPeres twice officially served as prime minister Israel s head of government His first stint spanned from 13 September 1984 through 20 October 1986 leading the 21st government during the first half of the 11th Knesset His second stint lasted from 4 November 1995 through 18 June 1996 serving in an acting capacity from 4 November through 22 November 1995 and in permanent capacity thereafter leading the 25th government as interim prime minister and the 26th government as permanent prime minister during the latter portion of the 13th Knesset In addition to these two official stints as prime minister Peres is also considered to have served as the de facto acting prime minister from 22 April through 21 June 1977 68 with Yitzhak Rabin remaining the de jure prime minister Peres served as president Israel s head of state from 15 July 2007 through 24 July 2014 182 Peres was a member of the Knesset Israel s legislature first from November 1959 through 15 January 2006 a record 47 year tenure 123 and again from March 2006 through 13 June 2007 His overall Knesset tenure of 48 years is the longest tenure in the history of the Knesset 183 Peres four times served as the leader of the Knesset s opposition For his first three stints in this role the opposition leader was an unofficial and honorary role His final stint in the position came after Knesset formalized the role as an official position Peres was the unofficial opposition leader from 20 June 1977 through 13 September 1984 during the entirety of the 9th and 10th Knessets During this stint he led the opposition to the Menachem Begin led 18th and 19th governments and the Yitzhak Shamir led 20th government of Israel His second stint as opposition lasted from 15 March 1990 through 13 July 1992 when in lead the opposition to the Yitzhak Shamir led 24th government during a portion of the 12th Knesset Peres third stint lasted from 18 June 1996 to 1 July 1997 and saw him lead the opposition to the Benjamin Netanyahu led 24th government during a portion of the 14th Knesset Peres final stint as opposition leader lasted from 25 June 2003 through 10 January 2005 and saw him lead the opposition to the Ariel Sharon led 30th government during a portion of the sixteenth Knesset Labor Party leadership Peres thrice served as leader of the Israeli Labor Party Tenures as Labor Party leader Tenure Predecessor Successor Knesset elections as leader Elected reelectedas leaderDecember 1977 February 1992 Yitzhak Rabin Yitzhak Rabin 1977198119841988 1977 Apr 1980 1984November 1995 June 1997 Yitzhak Rabin Ehud Barak 1996 1995June 2003 November 2005 interim leader Amram Mitzna Amir Peretz 2003Ministerial posts Peres held numerous ministerial posts over the course of his Knesset tenure He held major ministerial posts in twelve governments 183 Ministerial posts Ministerial post Tenure Prime Minister s Government s Predecessor SuccessorDeputy Minister of Defense 21 December 1959 25 May 1965 David Ben Gurion until 26 June 1963 Levi Eshkol after 26 June 1963 9 10 11 12 office established Zvi DinsteinMinister without Portfolio 15 December 1969 22 December 1969 Golda Meir 15 Minister of Immigrant Absorption 22 December 1969 27 July 1970 Golda Meir 15 Yigal Allon Natan PeledMinister of Communications 1 September 1970 10 March 1974 Golda Meir 15 Elimelekh Rimalt Aharon UzanMinister of Transportation 1 September 1970 10 March 1974 Golda Meir 15 Ezer Weizman Aharon YarivMinister of Information 10 March 1974 3 June 1974 Golda Meir 16 office established Aharon YarivMinister of Defense first tenure 3 June 1974 20 June 1977 Yitzhak Rabin 17 Moshe Dayan Ezer WeizmanMinister of Internal Affairs 13 September 1984 24 December 1984 Shimon Peres 21 Yosef Burg Yitzhak PeretzMinister of Religious Affairs 13 September 1984 23 December 1984 Shimon Peres 21 Yosef Burg Yosef Burg Designated Acting Prime Minister 20 October 1986 15 March 1990 Yitzhak Shamir 22 23 Yitzhak Shamir Ehud Olmert 2003 Minister of Foreign Affairs first tenure 20 October 1986 23 December 1988 Yitzhak Shamir 22 Yitzhak Shamir Moshe ArensMinister of Finance 22 December 1988 15 March 1990 Yitzhak Shamir 23 Moshe Nissim Yitzhak ShamirMinister of Foreign Affairs second tenure 14 July 1992 22 November 1995 Yitzhak Rabin until 4 November 1995 Shimon Peres interim after 4 November 1995 25 David Levy Ehud BarakMinister of Defense second tenure 4 November 1995 22 November 1995 interim minister 22 November 1995 18 June 1996 permanent minister Shimon Peres interim PM until 22 November 1995 and permanent PM afterwards 25 26 Yitzhak Rabin Yitzhak MordechaiMinister of Regional Cooperation 6 July 1999 7 March 2001 Ehud Barak 28 office established Tzipi LivniDeputy Prime Minister serving alongside Silvan Shalom Natan Sharansky and Eli Yishai 7 March 2001 2 November 2002 Ariel Sharon 29 Binyamin Ben EliezerMinister of Foreign Affairs third tenure 7 March 2001 2 October 2002 Ariel Sharon 29 Shlomo Ben Ami Ariel SharonVice Prime Minister first tenure 10 January 2005 23 November 2005 Ariel Sharon 30 office establishedVice Prime Minister second tenure 10 January 2006 13 June 2007 Ehud Olmert 31 Haim RamonMinister for the Development of the Negev Galilee and Regional Economy 10 January 2006 13 June 2007 Ehud Olmert 31 office established Yaakov EdriOther offices From 1952 through 1953 Peres was the deputy director general of the Israeli Ministry of Defense From 1952 through 1959 he was the director general Peres served as vice president of Socialist International He was elected vice president in 1978 Electoral history1996 direct election for Prime Minister 1996 Israeli prime ministerial election 184 Party Candidate Votes Likud Benjamin Netanyahu 1 501 023 50 50Labor Shimon Peres incumbent 1 471 566 49 50Total votes 2 972 589 100Presidential elections 2000 Israeli presidential election 185 186 Party Candidate First round Second roundVotes Votes Likud Moshe Katsav 60 50 63 52 5One Israel Shimon Peres 57 47 5 57 47 5Abstaining 3 2 5Total 120 100 120 1002007 Israeli presidential election 187 Party Candidate First round Second roundVotes Votes Kadima Shimon Peres 58 52 73 86 78 90Likud Reuven Rivlin 31 28 18Labor Colette Avital 21 19 09Against 23 19 10Total 110 100 109 100Party leadership elections 1974 Israeli Labor Party leadership election 188 60 Candidate Votes Yitzhak Rabin 298 53 99Shimon Peres 254 46 02Total votes 552 100February 1977 Israeli Labor Party leadership election 60 62 Candidate Votes Yitzhak Rabin incumbent 1 445 50 72Shimon Peres 1 404 49 28Total votes 1 997 100April 1977 Israeli Labor Party leadership election 65 60 Candidate Votes Shimon Peres unchallenged acclamation 1001980 Israeli Labor Party leadership election 60 Candidate Votes Shimon Peres incumbent 2 123 70 81Yitzhak Rabin 875 29 19Total votes 2 998 1001984 Israeli Labor Party leadership election Candidate Votes Shimon Peres incumbent unchallenged 1001992 Israeli Labor Party leadership election 60 189 Candidate Votes Yizhak Rabin 40 6Shimon Peres incumbent 34 5Yisrael Kessar 19 0Ora Namir 5 5Total votes 108 347 100Voter turnout 70 10 2003 Israeli Labor Party interim leader election 190 Candidate Votes Shimon Peres 631 49 14Efraim Sneh 359 27 96Danny Atar 281 21 89Abstaining 11 1 01Total votes 1 284 100Voter turnout 52 2005 Israeli Labor Party leadership election 60 191 Candidate Votes Amir Peretz 27 098 42 2Shimon Peres interim inccumbent 25 572 39 82Binyamin Ben Eliezer 10 764 16 76Voter turnout 63 88 See also Israel portal Biography portal Politics portalList of Israeli Nobel laureates List of Jewish Nobel laureatesReferences Peres Collins English Dictionary HarperCollins Retrieved 22 June 2019 Peres Shimon Lexico UK English Dictionary Oxford University Press Archived from the original on 24 April 2022 Peres Merriam Webster Dictionary Retrieved 22 June 2019 Amiram Barkat Presidency rounds off 66 year career Haaretz Archived from the original on 4 September 2007 Retrieved 6 July 2008 Shimon Peres The Last Link to Israel s Founding Fathers by DAVID A GRAHAM 27 September 2016 The Atlantic MAKING HISTORY By Benny Morris 26 July 2010 Tablet Magazine a b c d Tore Frangsmyr ed 1995 Shimon Peres The Nobel Peace Prize 1994 The Nobel Foundation a b Affaire de Suez Le Pacte Secret Archived 19 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine Peter Hercombe and Arnaud Hamelin France 5 Sunset Presse Transparence 2006 a b Eden By Peter Wilby Haus Publishing 2006 a b Political Leaders of the Contemporary Middle East and North Africa A Biographical Dictionary by Bernard Reich Greenwood Publishing Group 1990 page 406 Israeli politician Shimon Peres dies at 93 Washington Post 18 September 2016 a b THE JORDAN ISRAEL ACCORD THE OVERVIEW ISRAEL AND JORDAN SIGN A PEACE ACCORD archive nytimes com a b The Peres Center for Peace Who We Are Archived from the original on 27 September 2016 Retrieved 29 September 2016 Levine Daniel S 27 September 2016 Shimon Peres Dead How Did the Former Israeli Prime Minister Die Heavy Retrieved 28 September 2016 Wootliff Raoul 28 September 2016 Shimon Peres the last of Israel s founding fathers dies at 93 The Times of Israel Retrieved 28 September 2016 Obituary Shimon Peres Israeli founding father BBC News 28 September 2016 Retrieved 28 July 2020 Location of Wiszniew on the map of the Second Polish Republic in the years 1921 1939 jewishinstitute org pl Archived from the original on 19 July 2011 Knesset Member Shimon Peres Knesset Retrieved 13 February 2008 a b c d Shimon Peres Biography and Interview American Academy of Achievement 2017 Peres Not such a bad record after all The Jerusalem Post 10 November 2005 Retrieved 13 August 2014 Anderman Nirit 13 August 2014 Shimon Peres remembers very strong very beautiful relative Lauren Bacall Haaretz Tel Aviv Joseph Telushkin Rebbe Page 132 HarperCollins 2014 Judy L Beckham 2 August 2003 Shimon Peres 1994 Nobel Peace Prize Israel Times permanent dead link Levi Julian Hana 12 July 2007 President Shimon Peres Agrees to Keep Shabbat Once Arutz Sheva Retrieved 27 September 2016 a b It is true that we have erred but a bright spring awaits Shimon Peres Monday 16 July 2007 The Guardian a b c Shimon Peres obituary by Lawrence Joffe Wednesday 28 September 2016 SHIMON PERES Archived from the original on 27 September 2016 Retrieved 29 September 2016 a b בית הנשיא GOV IL a b c d e f g h i j k l m Bergersept Marilyn 27 September 2016 Shimon Peres Dies at 93 Built Up Israel s Defense and Sought Peace The New York Times Retrieved 28 September 2016 Gilbert Martin Israel A History Pages 116 117 Leshem Yossi 28 September 2016 Farewell Shimon Peres birds org il Peres to German MPs Hunt down remaining Nazi war criminals Haaretz 27 January 2010 Retrieved 27 January 2010 Address by Peres to German Bundestag Mfa gov il 27 January 2010 Retrieved 12 June 2014 a b Meranda Amnon 25 May 2007 Sonia Peres regains consciousness Ynetnews Retrieved 25 May 2007 Bar Zohar Michael 2007 Shimon Peres the biography Internet Archive New York Random House p 99 ISBN 978 1 4000 6292 8 Man in the News Israeli Model of Endurance Shimon Peres The New York Times 6 August 1984 Bar Zohar Michael 2007 Shimon Peres The Biography New York NY Random House pp 75 76 ISBN 978 1 40 006292 8 a b 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Rabin on Israeli Ballot Newspapers com The Sacramento Bee 10 April 1977 Retrieved 25 January 2022 a b Peres steps into Israel fray The Herald Statesman The Associated Press 11 April 1977 via Newspapers com Farrell William E 23 April 1977 Rabin Ends Service as Premier Peres Is Sitting In The New York Times Retrieved 26 May 2022 Shimon Peres Ninth President of Israel JPost com The Jerusalem Post 8 January 2019 Retrieved 10 February 2022 a b Howard Adam M 1992 Foreign Relations of the United States Government Printing Office p XXV ISBN 978 0 16 092101 8 Retrieved 10 February 2022 Greenway H D S 14 April 1977 Peace Efforts Unaffected by Rabin s Woes Washington Post Retrieved 10 February 2022 Begin Takes Israeli Post Newspapers com The Times San Mateo California The Associated Press 21 June 1977 Retrieved 26 May 2022 Omer Man Michael 13 May 2012 This Week in History The Likud upheaval JPost com The Jerusalem Post Retrieved 17 August 2022 The Nobel Peace Prize 1994 NobelPrize org Retrieved 26 April 2022 Joffe Lawrence 28 September 2016 Shimon Peres obituary The Guardian Retrieved 26 April 2022 a b c d e Rais Faiza R 2005 The Downfall of the Labour Party in Israel Strategic Studies 25 1 129 150 ISSN 1029 0990 JSTOR 45242570 Retrieved 17 August 2022 a b c d Rabin challenges Peres Labor Party leadership Newspapers com Chicago Tribune Reuters 4 July 1991 Retrieved 29 May 2022 Mahler Gregory S 2012 Introduction In Mahler Gregory S ed Israel after Begin SUNY Press pp 9 10 ISBN 9781438411699 ISRAELI PLANES ATTACK P L O IN TUNIS KILLING AT LEAST 30 RAID LEGITIMATE U S SAYS The New York Times 2 October 1985 Friedman Thomas L 27 March 1985 Israel to speed up Lebanon pullout The New York Times Retrieved 29 May 2022 Walsh Edward 21 July 1983 Israel Sets Pullback In Lebanon Washington Post Retrieved 29 May 2022 a b Arlosoroff Meirav 29 September 2016 Shimon Peres Father of the New Israeli Economy Haaretz Retrieved 26 April 2022 a b c Bahar Dany 30 September 2016 How Shimon Peres saved the Israeli economy Brookings Retrieved 26 April 2022 Yechaim Weitz 2 October 2021 Shimon Peres Was Never a Leader Haaretz Retrieved 26 April 2022 Diehl Jackson 23 July 1990 Israeli Labor Party Ends Rabin s Takeover Bid Washington Post Meydani Assaf 2009 Political Entrepreneurs and Institutional Change The Case of Basic Law The Government 1992 Political Transformations and Political Entrepreneurs Israel in Comparative Perspective Springer Publishing pp 41 104 esp 75 76 and 85 85 ISBN 9780230103979 Haberman Clyde 27 October 1994 THE JORDAN ISRAEL ACCORD THE OVERVIEW Israel and Jordan Sign a Peace Accord The New York Times Retrieved 29 May 2022 a b c d Oslo Accords Fast Facts CNN 3 September 2013 Retrieved 26 May 2022 a b 1994 Israelis and Arafat share peace prize BBC News 14 October 1994 Retrieved 29 May 2022 Nobel s regrets on Peres award bbc co uk 5 April 2002 a b CNN Middle East peace accord Sept 28 1995 CNN 28 September 1995 Retrieved 26 May 2022 Hedges Chris 22 April 1994 Peres and Arafat in Talks to Complete Accord The New York Times Retrieved 26 May 2022 Rabin assassinated at peace rally Nov 4 1995 CNN 4 November 1995 a b Brown Derek Black Ian Freedland Jonathan 6 November 1995 Israel s Yitzhak Rabin assassinated at peace rally archive 6 November 1995 The Guardian Retrieved 26 May 2022 Schmemann Serge 5 November 1995 ASSASSINATION IN ISRAEL THE OVERVIEW RABIN SLAIN AFTER PEACE RALLY IN TEL AVIV ISRAELI GUNMAN HELD SAYS HE ACTED ALONE The New York Times Retrieved 26 May 2022 a b c d e Kessel Jerrold 11 February 1996 Israeli elections will test support for peace Feb 11 1996 CNN Retrieved 26 May 2022 a b The Middle East and North Africa 2003 Psychology Press p 523 ISBN 978 1 85743 132 2 Retrieved 10 February 2022 NEWS SUMMARY The New York Times 14 November 1995 Retrieved 26 May 2022 Liebermann Oren 28 September 2016 Shimon Peres Israel s warrior for peace dies CNN Retrieved 26 May 2022 Israel s wars of choice push its politics further to the right Al Jazeera 22 July 2014 Lazar Berman Bennett defends actions during 1996 Lebanon operation The Times of Israel 5 January 2015 a b c d Beloved abroad polarizing at home Peres was the peace making face of Israel The Times of Israel 28 September 2016 Schmemann Serge 4 June 1997 Barak Retired Israeli Army Chief Elected Head of Labor Party The New York Times Retrieved 10 February 2022 a b c Kampeas Ron 7 July 1999 Barak s new Cabinet puzzles many Israelis Newspapers com The Daily Item Sunbury Pennsylvania The Associated Press Retrieved 4 June 2022 a b New Israeli leader envisions peace of the brave Newspapers com Tampa Bay Times Knight Ridder Newspapers 7 July 1999 Retrieved 4 June 2022 a b c Goldenberg Suzanne 8 January 2001 Polls scare Barak into alliance with Peres The Guardian Retrieved 4 June 2022 via Newspapers com 4 Palestinians killed dozens hurt Los Angeles Times 1 November 2000 Retrieved 4 June 2022 via Newspapers com Marshall Tyler 6 November 2000 Palestinians Curtail Gunfire to Reduce Their Own Casualties Los Angeles Times Retrieved 4 June 2022 via Newspapers com Talks Yield Mideast Truce Hartford Courant 2 November 2000 Retrieved 4 June 2022 via Newspapers com Marshall Tyler Wilkinson Tracy 3 November 2000 Jerusalem Car Bomb Kills 2 Leaders Cling to Truce Los Angeles Times Retrieved 4 June 2022 Friday Crucial To Israeli Palestinian Truce CBS News 3 November 2000 Retrieved 4 June 2022 East Roger Thomas Richard 2003 Israel Profiles of People in Power The World s Government Leaders 1st ed Psychology Press pp 247 251 ISBN 9781857431261 Kifner John 1 August 2000 Barak barely survives no confidence vote in Knesset Newspapers com Rutland Daily Herald The New York Times Retrieved 26 April 2022 Stay the Course Mr Barak Los Angeles Times 2 August 2000 Retrieved 26 April 2022 via Newspapers com Myre Greg 21 December 2000 It s now a three way race for Israel s top position Newspapers com Miami Herald The Associated Press Retrieved 4 June 2022 Curtius Mary 13 January 2001 Sharon Hawk Running on Peace Platform Los Angeles Times Retrieved 4 June 2022 via Newspapers com Gross Tom 14 January 2001 Barak urged to stand aside for Peres Newspapers com Sunday Telegraph London Retrieved 4 June 2022 Israel s Labor Party Picks Peres as Its Interim Leader Los Angeles Times 20 June 2003 Retrieved 25 January 2022 a b c Israel Labour head to meet Sharon BBC News 10 November 2005 Retrieved 13 June 2007 Peres loses party leadership bid The Guardian 10 November 2005 Retrieved 25 January 2022 Makovsky David 23 November 2005 Campaign Season Begins in Israel Part II Labor s New Leader Amir Peretz The Washington Institute Retrieved 8 February 2022 Verter Yossi 6 January 2006 Under Peres Kadima would win 42 seats under Olmert 40 Haaretz Archived from the original on 13 January 2006 Retrieved 21 July 2007 Mazal Mualem Yossi Verter amp Nir Hasson 9 January 2006 Shimon Peres calls on his supporters to vote Kadima Haaretz Archived from the original on 13 January 2006 Retrieved 21 July 2007 Hoffman Gil Stern 15 January 2006 Shimon Peres resigns from Knesset JPost com The Jerusalem Post Retrieved 10 February 2022 a b Hoffman Gil Stern Stern Keinon Herb 15 January 2006 Shimon Peres Dalia Itzik quit Knesset JPost com The Jerusalem Post Retrieved 10 February 2022 Peres elected Israel s president BBC News 13 June 2007 Retrieved 13 June 2007 Jim Teeple Shimon Peres Sworn In as Israel s President Archived 15 July 2007 at the Wayback Machine VOA News 15 July 2007 Shimon Peres State president Nobel laureate and now knight Haaretz 23 November 2008 Retrieved 8 July 2009 Medzini Ronen 14 June 2011 Peres becomes Sheikh Ynetnews New Peres center to showcase Israel tech spark dreams BY SHOSHANNA SOLOMON 21 July 2016 Times of Israel Ravid Barak Efrati Ido 14 September 2016 Former President Shimon Peres in Induced Coma After Suffering Major Stroke Haaretz Peres to remain sedated condition still serious but stable The Times of Israel AFP Former Israeli President Shimon Peres Medical Condition Deteriorates After Major Stroke Haaretz 27 September 2016 Baker Peter 13 September 2016 Shimon Peres Former Prime Minister of Israel Suffers a Stroke The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved 28 September 2016 Wohlgelernter Elli 28 September 2016 Shimon Peres former president and veteran Israeli statesman dies at 93 The Jerusalem Post Retrieved 28 September 2016 Condolences on the death of Shimon Peres 28 September 2016 10 55 Chinese President Xi Jinping expressed condolences to Israeli President following the death of Shimon Peres French xinhuanet com Posted on 28 September 2016 Shimon Peres was a steadfast friend of India Archived 11 October 2016 at the Wayback Machine thestatesman com Agencies New Delhi 28 September 2016 World leaders to attend funeral for Israel s Shimon Peres BBC News 28 September 2016 Retrieved 28 September 2016 Peter Beaumont 30 September 2016 Shimon Peres funeral Obama evokes unfinished business of peace talks The Guardian Retrieved 1 October 2016 Obama speaks at Shimon Peres funeral Euronews 30 September 2016 Statement by the President on the Death of Former Israeli President Shimon Peres 27 September 2016 a b Baker Peter World Leaders Gather to Mourn Shimon Peres and Possibly His Dream New York Times 30 September 2016 Netanyahu gives speech at funeral of Shimon Peres Times of Israel 30 September 2016 Abbas s farewell to Shimon Peres stirs controversy among Palestinians Jerusalem Post 4 Oct 2016 Thousands join world leaders for Peres funeral Fox News 30 September 2016 Bill Clinton Speech at Farewell Ceremony for Former Israeli President Shimon Peres Channel 90 30 September 2016 Secrets of Ben Gurion s Leadership Forward 5 December 2011 Retrieved 12 June 2014 Goldberg Jeffrey The Unbearable Smallness of Benjamin Netanyahu The Atlantic 29 September 2016 30 September 2016 Shimon Peres From Hawk to Dove Vision org Winter 2000 Archived from the original on 7 May 2007 Retrieved 13 June 2007 Israel s denials of the Armenian Genocide are hard to swallow Middle East Eye 23 April 2015 a b c Yair Auron 2003 Chapter 5 The Armenian Genocide s Recognition by States The Israeli Aspect The Banality of Denial Israel and the Armenian Genocide 1st ed New Brunswick U S A Transaction Publishers p 127 ISBN 0 7658 0191 4 Robert Fisk Peres stands accused over denial of meaningless Armenian Holocaust Archived from the original on 14 December 2007 Protest against Israeli foreign minister s remarks dismissing Armenian genocide as meaningless Anca org Archived from the original on 1 March 2005 Retrieved 12 June 2014 Ravid Barak 26 August 2007 Peres to Turks Our stance on Armenian issue hasn t changed Haaretz Archived from the original on 18 April 2009 Retrieved 12 June 2014 Pfeffer Anshel Peres Fight terror reduce global dependence on oil Archived 19 November 2009 at the Wayback Machine Haaretz May 5 2008 Peres says that Iran can also be wiped off the map Archived 17 July 2012 at the Wayback Machine Dominican Today 8 May 2006 Peres bombshell I stopped an Israeli strike on Iran Jerusalem Post 30 September 2016 Dr Bessma Momani PDF uwaterloo ca Archived from the original on 11 March 2012 President Shimon Peres Seventy years of public service Retrieved 29 September 2016 The Worst Kept Secret Israel s Bargain with the Bomb By Avner Cohen Columbia University Press 2013 page 173 How Shimon Peres laid the foundation for Start up Nation By NIV ELIS Jerusalem Post 29 September 2016 My Word Memories of reporting on the life and times of Shimon Peres By LIAT COLLINS Jerusalem Post 15 September 2016 Better brain research will make a better world Israeli President Shimon Peres Archived 2 October 2016 at the Wayback Machine Canadian Press By Diana Mehta 5 September 2012 Peres Nanotechnology Fund Starts Off With 5 Million Oded Hermon 6 July 2003 Haaretz New Peres center to showcase Israel tech spark dreams Times of Israel 21 July 2016 a b Fay Greer 20 January 2011 Jerusalem Post article on Sonya Gelman The Jerusalem Post Retrieved 12 June 2014 Cebedo Earl 20 January 2011 Wife of Israeli President Shimon Peres dies All Voices Archived from the original on 14 January 2014 Retrieved 26 June 2013 Not like other murderers Haaretz 5 November 2007 Anderman Nirit 13 August 2014 Shimon Peres remembers very strong very beautiful relative Lauren Bacall Haaretz Tel Aviv Raphael Ahren 28 September 2016 Larger than life Shimon Peres a legacy in pictures The Times of Israel Retrieved 29 May 2017 a b c Poems turn to song as ex leader turns 86 AP updated 17 August 2009 7 55 07 PM ET A ray of hope Jerusalem Post 28 October 2008 Shimon Peres Writes a Song to Celebrate Chinese New Year Reuters Haaretz 8 February 2016 a b c Esther D Kustanowitz Shimon Peres Israel s first social media president Jewish Journal 28 September 2016 Sharon Udasin WATCH Shimon Peres throws a paper airplane in the name of education 30 August 2015 Jerusalem Post Rory Jones In his 90s Shimon Peres Became Social Media Star 28 September 2016 Wall Street Journal PM to name Dimona reactor after Shimon Peres Moran Azulay Published 09 10 16 Headlines King s News Centre King s College London www kcl ac uk Archived from the original on 22 April 2019 Retrieved 22 April 2019 Foreign and Commonwealth Office Archived from the original on 25 September 2012 a b H R 2939 Summary United States Congress Retrieved 20 May 2014 Marcos Cristina 19 May 2014 House votes to award medal to Israeli president The Hill Retrieved 20 May 2014 Awarding of the 2015 Solomon Bublick Prize to President Shimon Peres afhu org American Friends of Hebru University Archived from the original on 16 January 2017 Retrieved 13 January 2017 Shimon Peres www mfa gov il Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs Retrieved 10 February 2022 a b Beaumont Peter 10 June 2014 Shimon Peres what you need to know about Israel s outgoing president The Guardian Retrieved 10 February 2022 Dieter Nohlen Florian Grotz amp Christof Hartmann 2001 CE Elections in Asia A data handbook Volume I ISBN 0 19 924958 X משה קצב נבחר לנשיא המדינה Moshe Katsav has been elected President ynet in Hebrew 31 July 2000 Retrieved 24 June 2022 תדהמה בכנסת קצב זכה ב 60 קולות הסתיים סיבוב הצבעה השני וואלה חדשות A Shock in the Knesset Katsav won 60 votes the second round of voting has ended וואלה in Hebrew 31 July 2000 Retrieved 24 June 2022 Ilan Shahar Mazal Mualem 13 June 2007 Peres wins presidency as challengers bow out Haaretz Retrieved 13 June 2007 Approval sought of new Israeli premier Newspapers com Rapid City Journal The Associated Press 23 April 1974 Retrieved 4 February 2022 Rabin wrests Labor Party leadership from Peres The Bangor Daily News The Associated Press 20 February 1992 Retrieved 8 February 2022 via Newspapers com פרס נבחר ליו ר הזמני נחזיר את המפלגה לגדולתה Peres was elected temporary chairman We will return the party to greatness ynet in Hebrew Retrieved 24 June 2022 התוצאות הסופיות בבחירות לראשות מפלגת העבודה Israeli Labor Party in Hebrew Archived from the original on 30 November 2005 Retrieved 4 May 2022 Further readingBar Zohar Michael Shimon Peres The Biography Random House 2007 Crichlow Scott Idealism or Pragmatism An Operational Code Analysis of Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres Political Psychology 19 4 1998 683 706 Golan Matti The Road to Peace A Biography of Shimon Peres Grand Central Pub 1989 Weiner Justus R An Analysis of the Oslo II Agreement in Light of the Expectations of Shimon Peres and Mahmoud Abbas Michigan Journal of International Law 17 3 1996 667 704 online Ziv Guy Why hawks become doves Shimon Peres and foreign policy change in Israel SUNY Press 2014 Ziv Guy Shimon Peres and the French Israeli Alliance 1954 9 Journal of Contemporary History 45 2 2010 406 429 online dead link Ziv Guy The Triumph of agency over structure Shimon Peres and the Israeli nuclear program International negotiation 20 2 2015 218 241 online dead link External links Wikimedia Commons has media related to Shimon Peres Wikiquote has quotations related to Shimon Peres Official Israeli Presidency website Shimon Peres on the Knesset website Official channel on YouTube The day Peres became a Sheikh in Persian Peres Center for Peace Biography at the Encyclopaedia Britannica Shimon Peres on Nobelprize org with the Nobel Lecture Shimon Peres biography at the Jewish Virtual Library Appearances on C SPAN Shimon Peres on Charlie Rose Column archive at The Guardian Shimon Peres collected news and commentary at Ha aretz Shimon Peres collected news and commentary at The Jerusalem Post Shimon Peres collected news and commentary at The New York Times BBC Sharon seals new Israel coalition Peres s metaphysical propensity to lose by Matthew Wagner published in The Jerusalem Post 10 November 2005 Former Labor Leader Shimon Peres Heading For Sharon s new party recorded Report from IsraCast Shimon Peres speaks at the Council on Foreign Relations about the Israel Lebanon conflict on 31 July 2006 Shimon Peres speaks at Cornell University A Conversation with Shimon Peres Presidency rounds off 66 year career by Amiram Barkat Haaretz President Peres s address to the 63rd session of the United Nations General Assembly 24 September 2008 Segment Interview on YouTube by Leon Charney on The Leon Charney Report Full Interview on YouTube by Leon Charney on The Leon Charney ReportParty political officesPreceded byYitzhak Rabin Leader of the Alignment1977 1992 Succeeded byYitzhak RabinLeader of the Labor Party1995 1996 Succeeded byEhud BarakPreceded byAmram Mitzna Leader of the Labor Party2003 2005 Succeeded byAmir PeretzPolitical officesPreceded byYitzhak Rabin Prime Minister of IsraelActing1977 Succeeded byMenachem BeginPreceded byYitzhak Shamir Prime Minister of Israel1984 1986 Succeeded byYitzhak ShamirPreceded byYitzhak Rabin Prime Minister of Israel1995 1996 Succeeded byBenjamin NetanyahuPreceded byMoshe Katsav President of Israel2007 2014 Succeeded byReuven Rivlin Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Shimon Peres amp oldid 1133453174, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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