Former Israeli President Shimon Peres Passes Away at Age 93

Image: By World Economic Forum from Cologny, Switzerland (World Economic Forum Annual Meeting Davos 2005) [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Shimon Peres, a leading political figure in Israel, only retired as the country’s president two years ago. He was a Prime Minister of Israel for two terms, became the president from 2007 until his retirement and was also a 1994 Nobel Peace Prize winner, which he shared with Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin.  He suffered a major stroke two weeks ago and was at the intensive care unit of the Sheba Medical Center in Tel Aviv since September 13. He lost his battle with the heart disease on September 28.

The last member of the founding generation of Israel

Shimon Peres was born on August 2, 1923 in Wiszniew, Poland, which is now called Vishnyeva, Belarus. He was 9 years old when his father immigrated to Palestine. The rest of his family followed and they settled in Tel Aviv. Mr. Peres was multilingual. He learned Polish while in school in Poland and spoke Russian, Yiddish and Hebrew at home. He also learned to speak French and English.

He was already active in socio-political groups at a young age and was a founding member of the Kibbutz Alumot. He held various positions in youth-related organizations, and by age 20, he became an elected official of the Working and Studying Youth national secretariat. He was one of the two party supporters of Mapai, and later caught the interest of David Ben-Gurion, the head of Mapai, which led to him being appointed in the party’s secretariat.

Moshe Dayan and Shimon Peres were the youth delegates of Mapai to the Zionist Congress held in Basel in 1946. A year later Ben-Gurion named him in-charge of arms purchases and personnel when he joined Haganah (later the Israel Defense Forces). He was appointed as head of Israel’s naval service in 1948 when the country received independence.

Vision

Mr. Peres has been quoted as saying that there is no alternative for peace and going to war makes no sense. He often spoke about a Middle East where Israel could harmoniously co-exist with other Arab nations. Still, he was one of the architects of Israel’s powerful armed forces. He was the Deputy Director-General of Israel’s Ministry of Defense, and was largely responsible for negotiating arms deals with foreign suppliers and conducted various secret negotiations that led to Israel being a nuclear power.

While he was one of the builders of Israel’s military strength, he was a man who longed for peace. When he received the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in the Oslo Accords, he was philosophical when he said that the strength of the Israeli military was responsible for them winning all the wars that were forced upon them. However, what they wanted was to never have the need to win victories again.

World leaders started paying tribute to Mr. Shimon Peres within hours of his death. He is survived by his children: daughter Zvia and sons Nehemya and Jonathan, 8 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren. His wife, the former Sonya Gelman, died in 2011.