Ehud Barak In Beit Shemesh, Israel In 1997 Editorial Image

Ehud Barak served as Israel`s Prime Minister from 1999 until 2001. But before he was elected, he, as leader of the left-of-center Labor Party upon Shimon Peres`s loss to Bibi Netanyahu in 1996, desired to establish a personal rapport with prospective voters which is why he visited the Jerusalem suburb of Beit Shemesh, then politically a bellwether town, on July 7, 1997, Barak was known for his valor as a soldier who led daring anti-terrorist operations, and he rose to become Israel Defense Force (IDF) Chief of Staff. He was a Chairman of the left-of-center Labor Party and ruffled feathers with Labor colleagues when he agreed to become Defense Minister in the right-wing government of Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu in 2009. Like Netanyahu, Barak has a degree from an elite American university, Stanford, to go with another diploma from Israel`s Hebrew University. He was elected prime minister in 1999, and in 2000, in the waning days of the Clinton administration Barak, Clinton, and Yasser Arafat appeared to be close to reaching an accord at Camp David until the talks abruptly collapsed. In this image he is surprised and pleased as a town resident approaches him with his card from the right-wing, then ruling Likud Party, which he burns.