Pinhas Lavon
Pinhas Lavon (Hebrew: פנחס לבון, born 12 July 1904, died 24 January 1976) was an Israeli politician, minister and labor leader, best known for the Lavon Affair.
Early life
Lavon was born in Kopychyntsi in what was previously Galicia in Austria-Hungary (now in Ukraine). He studied law at the University of Lviv, where he organized Histadrut organizations in the region. He made aliyah and moved to Mandate Palestine in 1929.
Political life
Lavon was elected to the first Knesset in 1949, and was appointed Minister of Agriculture in David Ben-Gurion's second government.
He retained his seat in the 1951 elections, and in 1952 was appointed Minister without Portfolio. Following Ben-Gurion's resignation, he was appointed Minister of Defense in 1954. However, following the Lavon Affair in which he was accused of involvement in terrorist bombings in Egypt, he resigned from the cabinet.
Nevertheless, he remained an MK following elections in 1955 and 1959, and was later 'absolved' of any involvement in the Egyptian bombings. He retired from public life in 1964 after a long-standing discord with Ben-Gurion and died in Tel Aviv in 1976.
External links
Pinhas Lavon on the Knesset website
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