Ex-Israeli president Peres dies at 93

Tel Aviv, September 28

Shimon Peres, former Israeli president who won a Nobel Peace Prize for attempting to end the century-old conflict with Palestine, died on Wednesday, two weeks after suffering a massive stroke, triggering an outpouring of emotional tributes from around the world.

Peres, 93, who twice served as prime minister of Israel and later as the country’s ninth president, suffered severe organ failure yesterday as well as irreversible brain damage caused by the massive hemorrhagic stroke he sustained on September 13.

An ardent admirer of India, Peres often hailed the country as the “greatest democracy on earth” and even backed a permanent seat for it at the UN Security Council.

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Peres had been hospitalised at the Sheba Medical Center at Tel HaShomer since suffering the stroke. He died in his sleep at around 3:00 am.

“Today with deep sorrow we bid farewell to our beloved father, the ninth President of Israel,” his son Chemi Peres said.

“Our father’s legacy has always been to look to tomorrow.

“We were privileged to be part of his private family, but today we sense that the entire nation of Israel and the global community share this great loss. We share this pain together,” he told reporters.

His defining achievement was as one of the key architects of the Oslo peace accords for which he was jointly awarded the Nobel peace prize with the then Israeli prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, and Yasser Arafat, the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

The Oslo peace accords constituted a historic breakthrough in the conflict between Jews and Arabs in Palestine. It was the first peace agreement between the two principal parties to the conflict: Israelis and Palestinians.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hailed Shimon Peres as a “visionary” and a “champion of Israel’s defence”.

“Shimon dedicated his life to the rebirth of our people,” Netanyahu, who was a political rival of Peres, said in a statement.

“As a visionary he looked to the future. As a champion of Israel’s defence, he strengthened its capacities in many ways, some of them still unacknowledged to this day,” he said.

The last rites of elder statesman, respected all over the world but seen as a polarising figure in his own country, will be performed on Friday and several world leaders, including US President Barack Obama are likely to attend it.

“A light has gone out, but the hope he gave us will burn forever,” Obama said in a statement.

“There are few people who we share this world with who change the course of human history, not just through their role in human events, but because they expand our moral imagination and force us to expect more of ourselves. My friend Shimon was one of those people,” the US President said.

Tony Blair, the former British prime minister, described M Peres as “someone I loved deeply” and a mentor.

In a political career spanning over seven decades, Peres virtually held every senior political office in Israel, including stints as Foreign and Finance minister.

He had been hospitalised twice earlier this year with heart problems but released quickly after his condition stabilised.

Credited with securing Israel by being the pioneer of nuclear deterrence, Peres tirelessly worked towards achieving peace with the Palestinians during the last three decades.

Despite enjoying global acceptance and serving as Prime Minister and President, Peres never won a popular vote in his entire political career.

Born in Wisniew, Poland, in 1923, Peres moved to British-mandate Palestine in 1932, where his story became the story of modern day Israel.

Peres entered politics in 1959 as a member of the left-wing Mapai party, a precursor to the modern Labor party.

“The longest serving of all of Israel’s public servants, Peres was a person about whom it could rightly be said: The history of the State of Israel is the history of Shimon Peres,” Jerusalem Post said. — PTI