Shimon Peres
Shimon Peres (born August 21, 1923), an Israeli politician, is the head of the Israeli Labour Party and served as 8th Prime Minister of Israel from 1984-1986 and 1995-1996 and Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2001-2002.
Early life
Shimon Peres was born in Poland. He moved to Tel Aviv, Israel with his family in 1934.
Shimon Peres is one of Israel's most senior politicians. Although he celebrated his 80th birthday not long ago, there is a wide consensus within Israel that he is as vigorous and vital as ever.
In the 1950s and the 1960s Peres was a diplomat in the ministry of defence and was involved in acquiring weapons for the young state of Israel. Peres efforts went superbly well as he managed to acquire the advance Dassault Mirage III French jet fighter and a nuclear reactor.
Although he was never won an election, Peres served twice as Prime Minister: once between 1984-1986 as part of rotation agreement with Likud's Yitzhak Shamir, and once between 1995-1996 after the assassination in prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.
He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 together with Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin.
Shimon Peres is interested in nanoelectronics.
In 1997 he founded the Peres Center for Peace.
"Television has made dictatorship impossible but democracy unbearable."
"You can kill a thousand; you can bring an end to life; you cannot kill an idea."
—on the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
"With the religious you can hardly negotiate. They think they have supreme permission to kill people and go to war."
"The Arab began to understand that is not poverty creating terror, but terror creating poverty. They are the victims of their own errors."
Political Career
Awards and interests
Quotes
"If a problem has no solution, it may not be a problem, but a fact - not to be solved, but to be coped with over time."Books
He is the author of several books, including The New Middle East and For the Future of Israel (ISBN 080185928X).External link
Preceded in first term by:
Yitzhak ShamirPrime Minister of Israel
Succeeded in first term by:
Yitzhak Shamir
Preceded in second term by:
Yitzhak RabinSucceeded in second term by:
Benjamin Netanyahu