Background

Menahem Begin was born on August 16, 1913, in Brest, Brestskaya Voblasts', Belarus to Zeev Dov Begin and Hassia Begin. He was the youngest of three children. His father was a timber merchant.

Education

After a year of a traditional cheder education, Menahem Begin started studying at a "Tachkemoni" school, associated with the religious Zionist movement.

Menahem Begin studied law at the University of Warsaw, where he learned the oratory and rhetoric skills that became his trademark as a politician and viewed as demagogy by his critics.

Career

Active in the Zionist movement throughout the 1930s, Menahem Begin became (1938) the leader of the Polish branch of the Betar youth movement, dedicated to the establishment of a Jewish state on both sides of the Jordan River.

When the Germans invaded Warsaw in 1939, Menahem Begin escaped to Vilnius; his parents and a brother died in concentration camps. The Soviet authorities deported Begin to Siberia in 1940, but in 1941 he was released and joined the Polish army in exile, with which he went to Palestine in 1942.

Menahem Begin joined the militant Irgun Zvai Leumi and was its commander from 1943 to 1948. After Israel’s independence in 1948, the Irgun formed the Ḥerut ("Freedom") Party with Menahem Begin as its head and leader of the opposition in the Knesset (Parliament) until 1967. He joined the National Unity government (1967-1970) as a minister without portfolio and in 1973 became joint chairman of the Likud ("Unity") coalition.

On May 17, 1977, the Likud Party won a national electoral victory and on June 21 Menahem Begin formed a government. He was perhaps best known for his uncompromising stand on the question of retaining the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, which had been occupied by Israel during the Arab-Israeli War of 1967. Prodded by U.S. President Jimmy Carter, however, Menahem Begin negotiated with President Anwar el-Sādāt of Egypt for peace in the Middle East, and the agreements they reached, known as the Camp David Accords (September 17, 1978), led directly to a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt that was signed on March 26, 1979. Under the terms of the treaty, Israel returned the Sinai Peninsula, which it had occupied since the 1967 war, to Egypt in exchange for full diplomatic recognition. Menahem Begin and Sādāt were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1978.

Menahem Begin formed another coalition government after the general election of 1981. Despite his willingness to return the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt under the terms of the peace agreement, he remained resolutely opposed to the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In June 1982 his government mounted an invasion of Lebanon in an effort to oust the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from its bases there. The PLO was driven from Lebanon, but the deaths of numerous Palestinian civilians there turned world opinion against Israel. Israel’s continuing involvement in Lebanon, and the death of Begin’s wife in November 1982, were probably among the factors that prompted him to resign from office in October 1983.

Achievements

• Begin's most significant achievement as Prime Minister was the signing of a peace treaty with Egypt in 1979, for which he and Anwar Sadat shared the Nobel Prize for Peace. In the wake of the Camp David Accords, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) withdrew from the Sinai Peninsula, which was captured from Egypt in the Six-Day War. Later, Begin's government promoted the construction of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Revolt: Story of the Irgun 1977
  • White nights: The story of a prisoner in Russia 1979

Views

Menachem Begin was said to have a radical nationalistic agenda. Begin's Herut party was described as a "terrorist, right-wing chauvinist organization in Palestine," "closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties". The British government regarded him as "leader of the notorious terrorist organization Irgun".

Quotations: "During the Holocaust, our people were not decimated, but "tertiated" - it was not one in ten, but one in three that were murdered."

Membership

• 

  Hashomer Hatzair , Poland

• 

  Leader of the Irgun

  Irgun , Israel

  1942 - 1948

• Corporal

  Anders' Army , Poland

  1941 - 1942

• 

  The Betar Movement

Personality

As his family was killed during the Holocaust, Menahem Begin was a strong opponent of nazism.

Despite being a leader of the right-centered Likud Party, Begin signed a peace treaty with Egypt in 1979. After his resignation, he also became disappointed by the war in Lebanon because he had hoped to sign a peace treaty with the government of President Bashir Gemayel.

Connections

Menahem Begin was married to Aliza Arnold and had 1 son and 2 daughters.

Father:

Zeev Dov Begin

Zeev Dov Begin was a timber merchant, was a community leader, a passionate Zionist, and an admirer of Theodor Herzl. He died during WW2.

Mother:

Hassia Begin

Hassia Begin died during WW2.

Spouse:

Aliza Arnold

Aliza Arnold died in November 1982.

child:

Hasia Begin

child:

Leah Begin

Son:

Benny Begin

Brother:

Herzl Begin

Herzl Begin died during WW2.

Sister:

Rachel Begin

Collegue :

Ariel Sharon

Together with Menahem Begin founded Likud Party.

Collegue :

Ze'ev Jabotinsky

comrade-in-arms:

Yitzhak Shamir

Collegue :

Anwar Sadat

Signed a peace treaty with Egypt in 1979.

References

• The Prime Ministers: An Intimate Narrative of Israeli Leadership
  2010
• The life and times of Menahem Begin: Rebel to statesman
  1979
• Menachem Begin: The Battle for Israel's Soul Jewish Encounters Series
  2014
• Peace in the Making: The Menachem Begin - Anwar Sadat Personal Correspondence Here, for the first time, is the complete correspondence between Israel’s Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egypt’s President Anwar el-Sadat as they wrestled with what would become their Nobel Peace Prize-winning accomplishment.
  2011
• Begin's Foreign Policy, 1977-1983: Israel's Move to the Right Contributions in Political Science
  1987
• Begin: The haunted prophet
  1984
• Begin: An anatomy of leadership
  1988