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Jerusalem, Undefined | AFP |
Israeli ex-president and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shimon Peres died on Wednesday, his personal doctor told AFP, some two weeks after suffering a major stroke.
The 93-year-old died at around 3:00 am (0000 GMT), Rafi Walden, who is also Peres’s son-in-law, told AFP. He did not give further details but said a press conference would be held in the coming hours.
Peres had been in hospital near Tel Aviv since September 13, when he was admitted feeling unwell and suffered the stroke with internal bleeding.
Israel has been on edge over the health of its last remaining founding father, who had been under sedation and respiratory support in intensive care.
Peres held nearly every major office in the country, serving twice as prime minister and also as president, a mostly ceremonial role, from 2007 to 2014.
He won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for his role in negotiating the Oslo Accords, which envisioned an independent Palestinian state.
Key dates in the life of Shimon Peres
– August 2 1923: Born Shimon Persky at Vishneva in what was then Poland and is now Belarus, he later took the Hebrew name Peres, meaning eagle.
– 1934: Arrival in British mandatory Palestine.
– 1959: Elected a member of parliament for Mapai, which would later become the Labour party.
– 1984-1986: Prime minister of a Labour-Likud government of national unity.
– 1993: Oversees secret negotiations with the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) which lead to the signing of the Oslo accords.
– 1994: Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize along with Yitzhak Rabin (assassinated November 1995) and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat (died November 2004) for their role in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
– 1995: Succeeds Rabin after his murder on November 4 as premier and head of the Labour party.
– June 2007: Elected Israel’s ninth president.
– July 2014: Stands down as president nine days before his 91st birthday and during the Gaza war, handing over his duties to Reuven Rivlin.
