Shlomo Argov
Shlomo Argov (
December 14,
1929 -
February 23,
2003) was a prominent
Israeli diplomat. He was the
Israeli
ambassador to the
United Kingdom whose attempted
assassination served as a
cause célèbre, leading to the
1982 Lebanon War.
Argov was born in
Jerusalem in 1929 into a family that had lived in the city for seven generations. He joined the
Palmach as a teenager, and joined the
Israeli Defense Force when it was formed in
1948. Argov was wounded in the
Battle of Safed during the
Israeli War of Independence, but continued in the military.
In
1950, he moved to
Washington D.C. to study for a BA in foreign relations at
Georgetown University, from which he graduated in
1952. He followed that up with an MA in international relations at the
London School of Economics in 1955.
His diplomatic career began in
1959. Argov served in a variety of positions, in
Ghana,
Nigeria, Washington (under then-
ambassador Yitzhak Rabin), and
New York, in addition to those in Jerusalem.
His first senior diplomatic posting came in
1971, when Argov became Israel's
Ambassador to Mexico, where he would remain until
1974. After a stint as Deputy Director General of Information at the Ministry for Foreign Relations, Argov was appointed
Ambassador to the Netherlands in
1977. He would serve in that role for two years, before being promoted to
Ambassador to the United Kingdom, one of the highest roles in the Israeli foreign service, in
1979.
On
June 3,
1982, three men approached Argov as he got into his car after a banquet at the
Dorchester Hotel, in
Park Lane,
London. One man shot Argov in the head. Though not killed, he remained in a coma for three months. The events left him permanently
paralysed and in need of constant medical assistance, which he received at the
Hadassah Hospital, in Jerusalem.
The attempted assassins were members of
Abu Nidal's organization (one of the assailants still jailed in the United Kingdom was his cousin, Marwan al-Banna). Israel stated that the attempt on Argov was the
catalyst for the
1982 Lebanon War that started on
June 6 and expelling the
Palestinian Liberation Organization from Lebanon.
In
2003, at the age of 73, Argov succumbed to the wounds inflicted by the would-be assassins.
*
Lebanon: A chronology of key events*
Israeli government's page on Argov*
Shlomo Argov: Israeli diplomat whose shooting triggered the invasion of Lebanon 
