Israel / Palestine: Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin speaking to the Knesset, 20 March 1979. Future Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Shamir is seated to his right. Photo by Yaakov Saar (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Menachem Begin (16 August 1913 Ð 9 March 1992) was an Israeli politician, founder of Likud and the sixth Prime Minister of the State of Israel. Before the creation of the state of Israel, he was the leader of the Zionist militant group Irgun, the Revisionist breakaway from the larger Jewish paramilitary organization Haganah. He proclaimed a revolt, on 1 February 1944, against the British mandatory government, which was opposed by the Jewish Agency. As head of the Irgun, he targeted the British in Palestine. During his leadership Irgun targeted Palestinian civilians in the Deir Yassin massacre. Begin was elected to the first Knesset, as head of Herut, the party he founded, and was at first on the political fringe, embodying the opposition to the Mapai-led government and Israeli establishment. He remained in opposition in the eight consecutive elections (except for a national unity government around the Six-Day War), but became more acceptable to the political center. His 1977 electoral victory and premiership ended three decades of Labor Party political dominance. Yitzhak Shamir (born Yitzhak Yezernitsky; October 22, 1915 Ð June 30, 2012) was an Israeli politician and the seventh Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms, 1983Ð84 and 1986Ð1992. Before the establishment of the State of Israel, Shamir was a leader of the Zionist terrorist group Lehi (the Stern Gang). After the establishment of the State of Israel he served in the Mossad between 1955 and 1965, a Knesset Member, a Knesset Speaker and a Foreign Affairs Minister. Shamir was the country's third longest-serving prime minister after David Ben-Gurion and Benjamin Netanyahu. (Photo by: Pictures From History/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)