Internationally known Israeli diplomat and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shimon Peres will visit Wayne State University Tuesday, May 2, to offer his perspectives on the peace process in the Middle East. His visit is sponsored by the university, Ford Motor Company and several Jewish community organizations.

Peres, a former prime minister of Israel, will take questions from the media at an 11 a.m. press briefing in Alumni Lounge, adjoining the university's McGregor Memorial Conference Center. At 11:30 a.m. he will deliver a lecture titled "Battling for Peace" to an invitation-only audience of some 500 persons in WSU's Community Arts Auditorium.

A key figure in Israel's politics and international affairs for more than 40 years, Peres served as prime minister from 1984-86 and as acting prime minister and minister of defense for six months in 1995-96. Currently, he is minister for regional cooperation. He won the Nobel Prize (with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat) in 1994 as an architect of the negotiations that resulted in the Oslo Accords.

A member of the Israeli Knesset since 1959, Peres has served his country in many capacities, including minister of foreign affairs, minister of information, deputy minister of defense, minister of immigrant absorption, minister of transport and communications, and member of the foreign affairs and defense committee.

He was minister of defense in 1976 when Israeli commandos staged a successful raid at the Entebbe, Uganda, airport to rescue hostages held by terrorists. During his two-year stint as head of state in the mid-1980s, he presided over the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon.

Born in Belorussia, Peres immigrated to what was then Palestine in 1934. In the war for independence in 1947-48, he was responsible for arms purchases and recruitment. A year later, he came to the United States as head of the Israeli Defense Ministry's procurement delegation. While in this country, he studied at Harvard University and the New York School for Social Research.

He has written several books that have been published in English, Hebrew and French. He is married and has three children.

The Wayne State visit was arranged through the Midwest office of the Consulate General of Israel. Cooperating in sponsorship are the Jewish Community Council of Metropolitan Detroit, Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, The Jewish Fund and the United Jewish Foundation.

Important note: Media representatives are invited to both the briefing at 11 a.m. and the lecture at 11:30 a.m. Please bring press identification for admission and allow time for a security check of equipment and carry-bags. If you have questions about parking or other arrangements, please call Cheryl Yurkovich or Tom Sakely at (313) 577-2150.