Menachem Begin — prime minister with roots in the Russian Empire
Menachem Begin was the sixth Prime Minister of Israel (1977-1983) and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate. Born in Brest-Litovsk (Russian Empire, now Belarus), he led the Irgun underground before Israel's independence, became leader of Likud, and signed the Camp David Accords with Anwar Sadat — the first peace treaty between Israel and an Arab nation.
Tracing the roots — Brest (Belarus)
Born in Brest-Litovsk (Brisk in Yiddish) in 1913 — one of the great centres of Talmudic learning and Jewish life in the Russian Empire — Begin survived the Holocaust (his parents and brother were murdered) and arrived in British Mandatory Palestine via the Soviet Gulag and the Polish army. His entire biography is Russian-Jewish history compressed into one life.
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Brest (Belarus). At the time, this region lay within the Russian Empire, which spanned from Poland to the Pacific.
A career defined by ambition
"Our right to exist has no need of being proven."