{"id":28780,"date":"2012-11-26T14:40:29","date_gmt":"2012-11-26T12:40:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/?p=28780"},"modified":"2012-11-26T14:40:29","modified_gmt":"2012-11-26T12:40:29","slug":"ehud-barak-resignsisraels-former-prime-minister-and-defense-minister-ehud-barak-retired-himself-middle-east-news-28780","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/ehud-barak-resignsisraels-former-prime-minister-and-defense-minister-ehud-barak-retired-himself-middle-east-news-28780\/","title":{"rendered":"Ehud Barak Resigns:Israel’s former Prime Minister and Defense minister, Ehud Barak retired Himself \/ Middle East News"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/h1>\n

Ehud Barak, Israel’s legendary war hero is former prime minister and resigned.<\/h1>\n

A liberal leader who once headed Labour, Barak nonetheless agreed in March 2009 to lead his party into the hawkish rightwing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.<\/p>\n

His sudden decision on Monday to conclude his storied career at the age of 70 came after a week-long air campaign in Gaza that the Israeli media said Barak was keen to conclude by signing up to an Egyptian-brokered truce.<\/p>\n

Some in the government opposed that truce, and Barak has come under increasing pressure from Netanyahu’s Likud party, much of which opposed his continuing position as defence minister.<\/p>\n

“I have decided to resign from political life and not participate in the upcoming Knesset elections,” Barak told a press conference in Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n

“I will finish my duties as defence minister with the formation of the next government in three months.<\/p>\n

Barak told the press conference he wanted to spend more time with his family.<\/p>\n

The shock announcement came amid speculation that Barak – anxious to break ties with the more rightwing leaders of the ruling coalition – would announce his decision to join another party ahead of the snap January 22 elections.<\/p>\n

His retirement also coincides with Israeli attempts to push the international community to exert more pressure on Iran over its contested nuclear program.<\/p>\n

Israel and much of the West believes the program is an attempt to build a nuclear weapon, and Netanyahu and Barak have been among the loudest voices in Israel warning that the state could take pre-emptive military action against Tehran.<\/p>\n

First appointed defence minister in June 2007, Barak brought Labour into Netanyahu’s government after his party was drubbed in 2009 elections.<\/p>\n

In 2011, he quit the party where he had spent his entire political career, forming the tiny Independence faction to stay in the government and his post as defence minister.<\/p>\n

It was the second major comeback for the former chief-of-staff, who withdrew from politics altogether after his 1999-2001 premiership, having tried and failed to make peace with then Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.<\/p>\n

He had offered unpopular concessions on east Jerusalem, wanted by the Palestinians as the capital of a future state, only to see Arafat spurn the offer and Israeli voters punish him with a resounding endorsement of veteran rightwing challenger Ariel Sharon.<\/p>\n

As prime minister, Barak oversaw Israel’s withdrawal from south Lebanon in 2000 after a two-decade occupation.<\/p>\n

In 2007, he won back Labour’s leadership from Amir Peretz after the latter resigned as defence minister following Israel’s disastrous war with Lebanon’s Shi’ite militant group Hezbollah the previous year.<\/p>\n

Barak, who is of European extraction and whose family name at birth was Brog, was born in a kibbutz that his parents helped to found.<\/p>\n

He holds degrees in physics, mathematics and systems analysis and is known to be keen on literature, poetry and music.<\/p>\n

His military career was legendary.<\/p>\n

In one episode he disguised himself as a woman on a commando raid in Lebanon to assassinate three senior Palestinian militants.<\/p>\n

He also took part in a commando assault in Tel Aviv in 1972 on a Belgian passenger plane hijacked by Palestinian guerrillas.<\/p>\n

And he participated in the 1976 raid to free Israeli hostages in Entebbe, Uganda, that saw the death of Yonatan Netanyahu, a brother of Israel’s current prime minister.<\/p>\n

Critics say Barak never really hung up his uniform for the civilian clothes of a politician. As prime minister, he infuriated Labour colleagues by making decisions without consulting them.<\/p>\n

Before his split with Labour, party members publicly expressed their anger over his decision to remain in the government despite the failure of peace talks.<\/p>\n\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ehud Barak, Israel’s legendary war hero is former prime minister and resigned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":702,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[80,63,1,118,37,14],"tags":[39011,39005,39008,39009,39003,267,39007,37858,39010,39002,39012,4250,39013],"class_list":["post-28780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-breaking-news","category-daily","category-general","category-hot","category-middle-east","category-world","tag-ehud-barak-resigned","tag-ehud-barak-resigns","tag-ehud-barak-retired","tag-ehud-barak-retired-himself","tag-ehur-barak","tag-israel","tag-israel-defence-minister-ehud-barak","tag-israel-middle-east","tag-israels-war-hero-ehud-barak","tag-israel-ehud-barak","tag-knesset-israel","tag-prime-minister-benjamin-netanyahu","tag-tel-aviv-ehud-barak"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28780","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/702"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28780"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28780\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28780"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28780"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalturk.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28780"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}