News service · Public domain

Born Aubrey Eban in South Africa, he became Israel's first ambassador to the United Nations and its second to the United States, later serving as foreign minister, education minister and deputy prime minister — a diplomatic career built on fluency in Arabic and Hebrew as much as political instinct. He served as vice president of the UN General Assembly and president of the Weizmann Institute of Science. Famous for a dry wit as sharp as his diplomacy, he once remarked that "the Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity."