Nobel Peace Prize laureates

In 1947 the UN sent Bunche to the Middle East, and in 1948 he became chief aide to the mediator, the Swedish count Folke Bernadotte⁴⁵. On 17 September 1948 Bernadotte was assassinated by Jewish extremists, and Bunche was named acting mediator⁴⁵. After 11 months of almost ceaseless negotiation he obtained signatures on armistice agreements between Israel and the Arab states – the 1949 Armistice Agreements⁵. According to the presentation speech at the ceremony, he negotiated with each side separately, because the Arab delegates refused to sit at the same table as the Jewish delegates⁶.

Bunche was the first African American to receive the Nobel Peace Prize⁴. He devoted his Nobel lecture, on 11 December 1950, to the United Nations: peace, he argued, needs a strong international organisation, and it also needs human progress – an end to colonial rule and help for newly independent peoples⁷. It is worth being exact about what the prize honoured: the Nobel Prize website describes the achievement as a ceasefire between Israeli and Arab forces, not peace⁴.

And what became of the agreements? They were armistice agreements, not peace treaties. Two of them were later replaced by full peace treaties: with Egypt in 1979⁸ and with Jordan in 1994⁹. The tracks with Syria and Lebanon are covered on the page the 1949 Armistice Agreements.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org
• Nobel lecture
• Biography on nobelprize.org

Begin won the election of May 1977¹¹. In the autumn of that year Egypt's President Anwar Sadat came to Jerusalem – Sadat's Visit to Jerusalem¹². From 5 to 17 September 1978 the two met at Camp David, with President Jimmy Carter mediating, and signed two framework documents – the Camp David Accords⁸. That is what the prize was for. It was awarded before there was a peace treaty: in his Nobel lecture on 10 December 1978 Begin spoke of a draft that could become a good treaty if signed and ratified¹³. The treaty was signed only on 26 March 1979⁸.

The choice drew protest. The Nobel Prize website notes that Begin had once led the Irgun, and describes that organisation as having used terror against the British authorities and Palestinian Arabs¹⁰. According to the same site, protests in Oslo were so strong that the ceremony was moved to Akershus Fortress¹⁰. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported heavy security at the time, and about 400 pro-Palestinian demonstrators and some 60 Norwegians protesting in the city centre¹⁴. The committee chair, Aase Lionaes, said in her speech that negotiations on the second framework – the one dealing with the West Bank and Gaza – still lay ahead¹⁵.

And what became of the agreement? The Egyptian–Israeli framework turned into the Egypt–Israel Peace Treaty, and on 25 April 1982 Sinai returned to Egyptian sovereignty¹⁶. The talks on Palestinian self-government produced nothing: Palestinian representatives refused to take part, and the gap between the Egyptian and Israeli positions was never bridged⁸. As of October 2026 the peace treaty is in force and security coordination continues, but political relations are strained¹⁷.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org
• Nobel lecture
• Menachem Begin Heritage Center

According to the Nobel Prize website, it was Sadat who took the initiative. Having broken Egypt's links with the Soviet Union, he turned to the United States to recover the territory Egypt had lost. In the autumn of 1977 he made a bold journey to Jerusalem and offered Begin a peace treaty in return for Sinai¹². The Camp David Accords followed, reached through the mediation of President Carter¹².

Sadat did not come to the ceremony in Oslo. He was represented by Sayed Marei, a former speaker of the Egyptian parliament, who read the Nobel lecture on his behalf¹⁴¹⁹. The lecture said that peace must rest on justice and on recognition of the rights of peoples, and that it must be comprehensive, involving all parties to the conflict¹⁹. In the Arab world opposition was fierce: according to the Nobel Prize website, many saw his steps as a betrayal of Palestinian interests²⁰. After the treaty was signed in 1979 the Arab League suspended Egypt and moved its headquarters from Cairo to Tunis; Egypt was readmitted in 1989¹⁸.

On 6 October 1981 Sadat was assassinated in Cairo. According to the Nobel Prize website, the killers opposed his policy of reconciliation with Israel and his close links with the United States¹². The treaty he signed outlived him: the Egypt–Israel Peace Treaty is still in force as of October 2026¹⁷.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org
• Nobel lecture

In 1974 Arafat addressed the UN General Assembly and spoke of an olive branch in one hand and a freedom fighter's gun in the other²¹. In 1988 the PLO renounced terrorism and backed the right of all parties to the conflict, Israel included, to live in peace and security²². On 13 September 1993 the Declaration of Principles (Oslo I) was signed in Washington: Mahmoud Abbas signed for the PLO and Shimon Peres for Israel²⁴. On 14 October 1994 the Nobel Committee announced the three laureates. It wrote that the conflict had been among the most irreconcilable and menacing in international politics, and that the step had required great courage on both sides²⁵.

This was one of the most disputed choices. Committee member Kåre Kristiansen resigned in protest against the award²⁶. According to the news agency AFP, he did so about an hour after the announcement, arguing that Arafat's past was too tainted by violence, terrorism and bloodshed²⁷. Geir Lundestad, a former director of the Nobel Institute, described the member who left as the leading spokesman in Norway for the Likud party²⁸. At the ceremony the committee chair, Francis Sejersted, answered critics who said the committee was too far from the conflict and should have waited: recognising an effort for peace, he argued, encourages it to continue²⁹.

And what became of the agreement? The Declaration of Principles was not a peace treaty. It provided for a Palestinian Authority to take on governing responsibilities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip over a five-year period²³. In November 1995 Rabin was assassinated, and a string of Hamas attacks eroded Israeli support for the process²³. The US State Department's historians conclude that by the end of 2000 an end to the conflict looked more distant than it had eight years earlier²³. As of October 2026, Security Council Report's forecast describes no negotiations on permanent status³⁰.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org
• Nobel lecture

In 1993 secret talks between Israelis and Palestinians took place in Norway. According to the Norwegian government, they were begun by the Israeli academics Yair Hirschfeld and Ron Pundak and the Palestinians Abu Ala and Hassan Asfour; Uri Savir and Joel Singer later joined on the Israeli side³⁵. According to the Nobel Prize website, Peres, as foreign minister, led the Israeli side in the talks³¹. On 13 September 1993 he signed the Declaration of Principles (Oslo I) in Washington on behalf of the Government of Israel²⁴.

The choice of Peres was criticised too. The Nobel Prize website itself notes that he established Israel's nuclear programme and is regarded as the architect of its nuclear weapons³¹. According to AFP, several members of the Nobel Committee later publicly regretted giving him the prize, because of his role in the government during Israel's 2002 military offensive in the West Bank²⁷.

In his Nobel lecture Peres described a different Middle East: free movement of people and goods, education for all, and cooperation against shared threats such as poverty and disease³⁶. That vision did not come about. The interim agreements never matured into a permanent settlement²³, and Peres himself lost the election half a year after Rabin was assassinated³².

• Facts page on nobelprize.org
• Nobel lecture
• Peres Center for Peace and Innovation

Rabin was a military man for most of his life: he fought in the 1948 war and rose to be chief of staff³⁷. When he was elected prime minister in 1992 he turned to negotiation with the Palestinians and backed the agreement worked out in secret in Norway – the Declaration of Principles (Oslo I)³⁷. In his Nobel lecture he spoke as a man who had commanded soldiers: about the heavy responsibility of sending people into battle knowing some will not return, and about the sanctity of human life as a value shared by all cultures³⁸.

The prize came on a hard day. According to AFP, on the very day of the announcement Rabin was dealing with the abduction of an Israeli soldier by Hamas. In the rescue attempt an officer and three of the captors were killed, and the abducted soldier was found dead. Rabin later said that he would rather have had the two Israelis alive than have the prize²⁷. Opposition to the agreements inside Israel was fierce. The Nobel Prize website notes that opposition to Oslo among some Jews was the background to Rabin's assassination by a religious extremist³⁷.

On 4 November 1995, at the end of a peace rally in Kings of Israel Square in Tel Aviv, Rabin was shot by Yigal Amir, a right-wing law student who opposed the Oslo process³². Peres succeeded him and lost the election of May 1996³². Another agreement Rabin signed has lasted: the Israel–Jordan Peace Treaty⁹.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org
• Nobel lecture
• Yitzhak Rabin Center

Twenty-four years passed between Camp David and Carter's prize. In the 2002 presentation speech the committee chair, Gunnar Berge, said that in 13 days and nights at Camp David Carter had shown that a mediator could make a decisive contribution to peace between Egypt and Israel⁴². So why did he not receive the prize in 1978, with Begin and Sadat? Berge explained: nobody had nominated him by the 1 February deadline, and no committee member added his name at the first meeting. The committee later wanted to include him, but the statutes of the Nobel Foundation made that impossible⁴². Berge called it one of the great omissions in the history of the prize⁴².

This prize did not pass quietly either, but the dispute was about Iraq, not about the Middle East of 1978. On the day of the announcement, in October 2002, Berge said the choice should also be seen as criticism of the line the US administration of the time was taking on Iraq. Other committee members distanced themselves: Hanna Kvanmo said this was his personal view and that the committee had not discussed any such interpretation⁴³.

In his Nobel lecture Carter returned to the Middle East. In his view, at Camp David in 1978 and in Oslo in 1993 Israelis, Egyptians and Palestinians endorsed the only reasonable prescription for peace: UN Security Council Resolution 242⁴⁴. That is Carter's position, not an agreed finding. The presentation speech noted that he was the first US president to favour a homeland for the Palestinians, and that he demanded Israel stop building new settlements in the West Bank⁴².

• Facts page on nobelprize.org
• Nobel lecture
• The Carter Center

This is a prize for stopping a war in our region. On 29 October 1956 Israel entered Egyptian territory; the next day Britain and France issued an ultimatum to Egypt and then attacked as well. The Security Council was paralysed by the British and French veto⁴⁶. On 4 November Pearson put a resolution to the General Assembly: the Secretary-General should present within 48 hours a plan for an international force to secure and supervise the end of the fighting⁴⁶. That is how the UN Emergency Force was born. In the 1960s Pearson was Prime Minister of Canada⁴⁵.

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This prize is not only about the Middle East, but it touches it. According to the Nobel Prize website, the committee noted that Hammarskjöld had built an efficient and independent UN Secretariat, and that he organised a peacekeeping force in the Middle East after the Suez Crisis⁴⁷. He died in September 1961 and the prize was awarded to him that year. He is the only person to have received the Nobel Peace Prize posthumously²⁸.

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A prize for an organisation, not a person. Between 1948 and 1988 more than 500,000 people from 53 countries served in the forces, and 733 of them were killed. The Middle East is listed among the areas of operation, alongside Kashmir, Cyprus and the Congo⁴⁸. The presentation speech said that peacekeeping operations began in 1956, when the UN Emergency Force was set up in the Suez Crisis⁴⁹. The forces' job: to report, create buffer zones, supervise armistices and deliver humanitarian aid⁴⁸. This is not a prize for a peace treaty. It honours keeping things quiet until there is one.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org

Ebadi was one of Iran's first women judges and lost her post after the 1979 revolution. She opened a law practice and defended people who were persecuted, and in 2000 she was imprisoned for criticising the country's religious rule⁵⁰. She worked to change inheritance and divorce law and supported separating religion from the state⁵⁰. According to the Nobel Prize website, the committee also wanted, with this choice, to ease tension between the Muslim world and the West after 11 September 2001 and to support the reform movement in Iran⁵⁰.

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ElBaradei, an Egyptian lawyer and diplomat, headed the IAEA from December 1997⁵¹. The agency was set up in 1957 to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy and prevent the spread of nuclear weapons; its inspectors check installations in states that have signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty⁵². According to the Nobel Prize website, before the 2003 war the agency refuted claims of a nuclear programme in Iraq – and was later shown to have been right⁵². This is a prize for international oversight, not for an agreement between two states.

• ElBaradei – facts page on nobelprize.org
• IAEA – facts page on nobelprize.org

Karman is the first Arab woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize⁵³. She spoke out against the rule of President Saleh in Yemen and demanded democracy and press freedom. Because of her work with the organisation she founded, Women Journalists Without Chains, she was detained and harassed⁵³. In 2011, during the Arab Spring, she was one of the leading activists, and she also worked for reconciliation between religious communities⁵³.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org

After the 2011 uprising Tunisia stood on the brink of civil conflict. The four organisations – workers, employers, human rights activists and lawyers – launched a national dialogue among the parties, which made it possible to adopt a new constitution, followed by parliamentary and presidential elections⁵⁴. The committee noted the cooperation between Islamist and secular movements⁵⁴. It is an example of how civil organisations, not only leaders, can prevent violence.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org

Murad belongs to the Yazidi minority. In 2014, when she was 19, the Islamic State group attacked her village, murdered hundreds of men and abducted young women. She was held captive for three months, suffered severe sexual violence, and escaped⁵⁵. Since then she has spoken publicly on behalf of the victims. In her Nobel lecture she said that only justice and the prosecution of the criminals can restore the victims' dignity⁵⁶.

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In 2003 Mohammadi joined the Defenders of Human Rights Center, founded by Shirin Ebadi, that year's laureate. She helped detained activists, led a campaign against the death penalty and denounced torture and sexual violence in prisons⁵⁷. According to the Nobel Prize website, she has been arrested 13 times and sentenced to a total of 31 years in prison and 154 lashes. When the prize was announced she was held in Evin prison in Tehran⁵⁷. She was not released to come to Oslo. Her 17-year-old twins, Kiana and Ali, received the prize on her behalf and read the lecture she had written⁵⁸.

• Facts page on nobelprize.org