Efraim Halevy

Efraim Halevy ( _he. אפרים הלוי) (born: 1934) is a lawyer and an Israeli intelligence expert. He was the ninth director of Mossad and the 4th head of the Israeli National Security Council.

Above all, he is remembered for his part in bringing about the peace treaty with Jordan. The special relationship he developed with King Hussein made it possible for Halevy to open Jordan to the awareness that only a peace agreement with Israel would extricate the Hashemite kingdom from the crisis after the Gulf War. [http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=336836 The waiting game, written by Ari Shavit]

Halevy was born in the United Kingdom to an established Orthodox Jewish family. He emigrated to Israel in 1948. He attended Ma'aleh, a religious high school in Jerusalem, and later, graduated (with commendation) in law. Between 1957-1961 he was the editor of the journal "Monthly Survey" (סקירה חודשית), published by the Chief Education Officer. In 1961, he began his work in the Mossad. In 1967, he was selected to the Chief Branches Forum.

Halevy remained in the Mossad for the next 28 years, heading three different branches throughout. Between 1990-1995, under the directorship of Shabtai Shavit, he served as deputy director and as head of the headquarters branch. In March 1998, he became the director of Mossad following the resignation of Danny Yatom. In 1996, he became the Israeli ambassador to the European Union in Brussels.

Halevy served as the envoy and confidant of five Prime Ministers: Yitzhak Shamir, Yitzhak Rabin, Benjamin Netanyahu, Ehud Barak and Ariel Sharon. He took an active part in a special mission by Rabin in forging the Israel-Jordan Treaty of Peace. After the failure of the Mossad operation to assassinate Hamas leader Khaled Mashal in 1997, he took an active part in Benjamin Netanyahu's mission to return the Mossad men captured in Jordan, and to settle the crisis with the King of Jordan.

On October 2002, he was appointed the second head of the National Security Council and an advisor to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. In June 2003, he resigned from this position after Dov Weisglass, the bureau chief of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, isolated and neutralized him, [http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=336836 The waiting game, written by Ari Shavit] , and Prime Minister Sharon refrained from accepting his recommendations on a host of issues and went to teach at Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the author of the book "The role of the intelligence community in the age of strategic alternatives for Israel."

He is known as a hard-headed pragmatist on issues involving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, willing to ruffle feathers on the right and the left, unlike many others in the intelligence establishment who are known to take more extreme ideological positions on these issues.

Halevy believes that Israel should take up Hamas’s offer of a long-term truce and try negotiating, because the Islamic movement is respected by Palestinians and generally keeps its word, he said. He pointed to the cease-fire in attacks on Israel that Hamas declared two years ago and has largely honored. “They’re not very pleasant people, but they are very, very credible,” Halevy said. [http://www.forward.com/articles/10055/ Experts Question Wisdom of Boycotting Hamas, Orly Halpern, The Forward, Feb 9, 2007]

In 2006 he published the book "Man in the Shadows" [cite book |last=SHalevy |first=Efraim |title=Man in the Shadows: Inside the Middle East Crisis with a Director of Israel's Mossad |year=2006 |publisher=St. Martin's Press|isbn=-10: 03-1233771X|pages=304] , covering Middle Eastern history since the late 1980s. Halevy was interviewed about his book on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on April 24, 2006, and by guest host Brian Ross on the Charlie Rose Show [http://www.charlierose.com/guests/efraim-halevy Charlie Rose]

References

* [http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=336836 Ha'aretz article on Israel's Gaza Disengagement containing a Useful biography] ,
* [http://www.afhu.org/site/press_releases/news_ex_Mossad.htm "EX-MOSSAD CHIEF HEADS CENTER AT HEBREW UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY" from American Friends of the Hebrew University]

External links

* [http://www.economist.com/opinion/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2963194 Halevy editorial in the Economist]
* [http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/B96BD51C-1F92-4869-BF64-E89F55FD0F53.htm Ex-Mossad chief says Hamas cannot win] Aljazeera.net