BICOM

Israel’s fifteenth Chief of Staff, Amnon Lipkin-Shahak died yesterday at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Hospital following a prolonged battle with leukaemia.

Lipkin-Shahak enjoyed a long and distinguished military career, serving as a company commander in the 1967 Six Day War and was twice awarded the Medal of Valour before being appointed head of Central Command and then head of Military Intelligence. In 1991, Lipkin-Shahak became deputy chief of staff, before succeeding Ehud Barak as chief of staff in 1995 until his retirement from the military in 1998.

He then turned his attention to the political arena. He was a leading figure in the short-lived Centre Party and having been elected to the Knesset in 1999 was immediately appointed tourism minister and later transportation minister in Ehud Barak’s government. However, he resigned from the Knesset following Barak’s electoral defeat to Ariel Sharon in 2001.

Lipkin-Shahak was intimately involved in peace negotiations with the Palestinians, leading the Israeli military team in negotiating the 1994 Gaza-Jericho Agreement and as a negotiator at the Camp David summit in 2000. In 2003, he became a leading supporter of the Geneva Initiative, an unofficial outline of a proposed peace treaty supported by former Israeli and Palestinian officials.

Paying tribute to Lipkin-Shahak, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday called him “an Israeli hero who dedicated his best years to the security of the State of Israel.” President Shimon Peres said, “Amnon was a true hero who carried the torch of peace, a rare and exceptionally wise man,” while Defence Minister Ehud Barak commented “He was one of the security pillars of Israel over the last two generations.” Lipkin-Shahak will be buried with full military honours this afternoon in Tel Aviv.