On the Death of Schimon Peres
The former Israeli Prime Minister Schimon Peres has passed at the age of 93. DIE LINKE party chairs, Katja Kipping and Bernd Riexinger, declare:
“With the demise of the former president of state the world also loses a part of its history. Schimon Peres was one of the last politicians who actively helped shape the founding of the state of Israel. Until the last moment the Holocaust survivor sharply criticised the politics of Israel and demanded a two-state solution. The peace process with the Palestinians had a clear beginning and a clear solution: two states for two nations – that was his message. Together with Israeli Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yassir Arafat, Schimon Peres received the Nobel Peace Price in 1994. His engagement leading to the first Oslo contract, by which Israel acknowledged the PLO as representative of the Palestinian people, was important for the process towards a two-state solution.
The Nobel Peace Price winner was never undisputed. As leader of the Workers’ Party Peres implemented radical privatisations and market liberalisation; which generated a lot of critique of the Honorable President of the Socialist International. His claim for a two-state solution was always accompanied by an understanding of military violence as a means of protecting the existence of Israel in the Near East. in his role as a poet Schimon Peres also realised a peace policy beyond violent escalation: “Forget your borders, ignore your cages and fly freely” and: “Provide my enemy and my friend with an unbloody day. Invite boys and girls to pray for peace.”