Lova Eliav - long time dove and paticipant of the dialogue with the PLO - dies at 89

Long-time politician and educator Aryeh 'Lova' Eliav passed away on Sunday. He was 89. Eliav was  a senior member of the Labor party for many years, was for some time the party sectary, but fell out about Labour's settlement policy and the policy towards the PLO. Among people from the peace camp outside Israel like me, he will be best remembered as one of the people who started talking with PLO-representatives back in 1974, together with people like Uri Avnery, Matti Peled and Jaacov Arnon (Jaap van Amerongen).
Eliav was born in Moscow and arrived in Israel, then British Mandatory Palestine, with his family at the age of three. At the age of three. At age 15 he joined the Haganah Jewish defense organization, and in 1941 he volunteered for the British army and fought in World War II.
Eliav entered the political scene in 1965, winning a seat in the sixth Knesset with the (first) Ma'arach party, the predecessor of today's Labor. Also he became party secretary. He left Labor a decade later due to his opposition to the foundation of Labour settlemnets on the West Bank. He served as a member of Ya'ad, and then of Sheli, but returned to Labor in 1979 and remained in the party until 1992.