Former Israeli President Shimon Peres, 93, served a seven-year term as president, which he completed in 2014 and has been active through his Peres Center for Peace, which promotes coexistence between Arabs and Jews.
He was hospitalized in very serious condition on Tuesday with major brain bleeding after suffering a stroke, the director of Sheba Medical Center confirmed.
Hospital director Professor Yitzhak Kreis told reporters that "the ninth president of Israel, Shimon Peres was treated by the best doctors at Sheba Medical Center, by a multidisciplinary team and has undergone a number of CAT scans, and is now sedated and intubated in the intensive care unit and we're watching him constantly. We'll update you later."
Shimon Peres's son Chemi also addressed reporters, thanking the hospital's doctors and saying: "We will need to make decisions later on, not now. Everything depends on how things develop and we don't know more than that right now."
Chemi Peres went on to say that he wanted to tell well-wishers that "there is nothing more important to my father than Israel. He loves the people from the bottom of his heart. I believe my father is an extraordinary person and I'm staying optimistic."
Wishes of a speedy recovery for Peres immediately began pouring in.
"Shimon, we love you and the entire nation hopes you will recover," said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Current President Reuven Rivlin expressed his concern of Peres' condition and said he is "praying together with the entire nation for my friend Simon's recovery."
Opposition leader Isaac Herzog of the Zionist Union party said "our dear Peres, we hope you recover quickly and return to have your clear, wise, and sober voice heard.”
The 93-year-old was hospitalized on January 14 for a heart condition and underwent catheterisation to widen an artery.
He was released on January 19 but forced to cancel a planned trip the following day to the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he had scheduled 15 meetings with world leaders and international officials.
A co-architect of the 1993 Oslo peace accords, Peres won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with then Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated the following year, and the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
Associated Press
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