Shimon Peres: The Biography (Hardcover)

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Editorial Reviews

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Even to his admirers (and there are many), Shimon Peres remains a frustratingly enigmatic figure. He is widely esteemed internationally as a statesman of the first order. Yet, although he has twice served as prime minister, Peres has never been a personally popular figure within Israel. Bar-Zohar has known Peres for years and received his full cooperation in writing this biography. In describing his subject's long and varied life, Bar-Zohar is consistently confronted with contradictions. Although often viewed as an intellectual, Peres has had little formal education, and although he often seems warm and engaging, many view him as chilly and detached. He speaks with the voice of moderation and compromise, but Peres' quarrels with other Israeli politicians are legendary for their length and vitriol. Bar-Zohar begins this engrossing saga with the shock of the assassination of Rabin, which elevated Peres to the position of prime minister. He then reverts to Peres' childhood in the Russian Empire and follows his rise to power in Israel. This is an excellent examination of a man who still remains a powerful actor on the stage of Israeli politics. Jay Freeman
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Product Description

Twice Israel’s prime minister, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, bold leader in a war-torn region, Shimon Peres is one of the great statesmen of the modern world. Peres is also a fascinating, complex man–a brilliant intellectual who is entirely at home in the corridors of power; an individual revered by the world and yet highly controversial in his own country; at once a hero and a figure of tragedy. Now, in this definitive biography, Michael Bar-Zohar takes the full measure of a towering, enigmatic leader.

Drawing on his decades-long association with Peres, as well as the full cooperation of the leader’s family, friends, supporters, and political rivals, Bar-Zohar has crafted a vibrant, daring, richly textured portrait of a man whose life and career span the entire history of Israel. Born in Poland in 1923, Peres emigrated to the Holy Land at the age of twelve, already a fiercely idealistic Zionist. Peres joined a kibbutz and, while still in his teens, became the leader of a major youth movement. When the struggle for Israeli independence broke out, future prime minister David Ben-Gurion tapped him to join his inner circle.

As director general of the Defense Ministry under Ben-Gurion, Peres spearheaded a far-reaching campaign to turn Israel into a major military power. He jump-started Israel’s aircraft industry, forged a secret alliance with France, and successfully pursued his dream of making Israel a nuclear power. And yet Peres’s real triumph came not as a man of war but as a peacemaker.

Elected prime minister in 1984, Peres brought new hope by pulling Israeli troops out of the quagmire in Lebanon, defusing tensions with Jordan, and, at the risk of his own political future, making serious overtures to the Palestinians. Peres and his longtime rival Yitzhak Rabin together secured the top-secret Oslo Accords of 1993, which won them and Yasser Arafat the Nobel Peace Prize–only to see the hope of peace shattered in a resurgence of regional violence.

In a half-century of leadership, Peres has worked beside–or fought against–such giants as Moshe Dayan, Golda Meir, Menachem Begin, Ariel Sharon, and, tragically, Rabin, who was slain at the rally that marked his reconciliation with Peres. Still powerful in his eighties, Peres stands as a true hero, a visionary who embodies the history of his nation. In this stunning, courageously frank, and scrupulously factual biography, Michael Bar-Zohar gives an eminent man his due.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 576 pages
• Publisher: Random House; 1st American edition (February 27, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400062926
• ISBN-13: 978-1400062928
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.3 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #811,222 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The story of a pioneer and visionary Israeli politiican and senior world statesman, March 9, 2007

By	Shalom Freedman "Shalom Freedman" (Jerusalem,Israel) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)

Shimon Peres is today the world's senior statesman. He has been in the center of Israel politics for close to sixty years. As a young assistant of Ben- Gurion he made critical contributions to Israel's early struggles for independence and survival. It was Peres more than anyone else who formed the Franco-Israeli alliance key to the 56' Sinai Campaign. It was Peres who initiated the program of cooperation with France which led to the Dimona nuclear reactor project.
Peres in his early years was Mr. Security, and contributed greatly to the building of Israel's Army and power of deterrence.
Peres has always been a person of vision and ideas. In fact the writer Amos Oz is quoted by Bar- Zohar as saying that Peres had more 'vision' than any other Israeli leader including Ben- Gurion.
This capacity for dreaming great dreams has however often gotten Peres in trouble with the Israeli public. The most conspicuous example of this is the Oslo Peace process which he is considered to be a principal architect of. There was great hope in 1993 when Peres and Rabin signed a peace treaty on the White House lawn with Arafat. But since then the whole process has unraveled , and is considered now to have been a major mistake in Israeli policy.
Bar-Zohar tells of the paradoxical qualities of Peres who has time and again lost critical elections which appeared at first to be in the bag. This is the Peres who twice was an excellent Prime Minister of Israel and also served throughout his long career as Defense Minister, Transport Minister, Information Minister, and more.
This biography opens with a dramatic scene at Ichilov hospital after the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin. Peres the long-time rival and at this point ally of Rabin is called upon again in the critical moment to serve Israel. He does it with responsibility, and decisiveness of a kind which often makes him enemies.
This detailed story of one person really tells the history of modern Israel . Peres after all has been involved in so many crucial decisions whether for right, in his urging the Entebbe rescue operation, or for wrong in his opposing Begin's bombing of the nuclear reactor in Iraq.
In his ninth decade and still going strong as Israel's Deputy Prime Minister Peres is candidate for the largely ceremonial role of the Israeli Presidency.
This is the story of a devoted, courageous responsible visionary Israeli and human being, who has made many mistakes in his life. These mistakes as Bar- Zohar amply makes clear have been more than cancelled out by his remarkable contribution to the building of modern Israel.
This is a highly recommended wonderfully readable biography.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A remarkable man-a remarkable book, March 15, 2007

By	EC "Avid reader" (Tennessee USA) - See all my reviews

This book is a page turner which is no small feat for a biography. I learned so much about the man, Peres, and about his country. Between this book and Bar-Zohar's book on Ben Gurion, one gets a comprehensive and extremely readable history of the founding and history of Israel.
To say that Peres is a complex but fascinating man is an understatement. One minute you are cheering for him and the next scratching your head about his crazy ideas like the founding of a Jewish colony in French Guyana.
Early in his life Peres thought he would be content to be a farmer on a kibbutz. Fortunately for Israel, Ben Gurion recognized Peres unique visionary abilities and challenged him in multiple ways-to find weapons for Israel, first in France, then Germany; to build cities where none had been before, to build a nuclear reactor, and to build Israel's defense system from the ground up. Bar Zohar repeatedly refers to Peres as Mr. Security and documents how almost all of Peres choices and decisions have been motivated from that perspective. In contrast to his genious, Peres tendency to sabatoge himself politically makes one wonder what he could have done if he had been a master politician in addition to being a great stateman. In the end, one has to admire what this one man has done and will continue to do to for his homeland, Israel. The value of his contributions can not be overestimated.
This is a great book, one of the best that I have ever read. Bat Zohar is a meticulous historian and a great story teller. This book, Shimon Peres, is required reading for anyone interested in Israel, her leaders, and the history of the most important democracy in the Middle East.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bar-Zohar Scores with Peres, March 11, 2007

By	Richard A. Blumenthal "History Buff" (Sarasota, FL USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This revealing, no holds barred biographic work is a tell all of one of the great statesmen of our time. Bar-Zohar presents it all and gets inside this very private persons life history. Reads like a novel but with documented facts and references.
Should be in every reader's library!