Peres in dramatic decline, family urged to say its goodbyes
Former president Shimon Peres went into severe organ failure on Tuesday morning and is in terminal condition, after two weeks of being in stable but serious condition following a massive hemorrhagic stroke he suffered at Sheba Medical Center while he was getting checked for a severe headache.
According to sources close to Peres, the 93-year-old has suffered irreversible brain damage.
The former president remained sedated, but was independently breathing. The damage from the swelling of the brain apparently occurred soon after his stroke on September 13, but had initially been undetectable.
Yet on Tuesday, a sudden shift of dead brain cells occurred and his parameters began to be unstable.
Prof. Rafi Walden, his son-in-law and deputy director-general of the hospital, said that “his condition is extremely serious.”
Doctors and family members had been cautiously optimistic after the stroke because the veteran statesman was able to identify some of them and responded to instructions such as grasping their hands.
However, on Tuesday, Channel 10 reported that doctors had urged close relatives of the former president to say their last goodbyes. Family members were at his bedside on Tuesday.
Tuesday’s change came as a shock less than a week after doctors had taken steps toward the process of weaning him from his respirator.
Peres underwent another CT scan last Wednesday, and his doctors at the time had decided to continue conservative treatment and ongoing neurological follow-up.
Meanwhile, President Reuven Rivlin prayed for Peres during a state visit in Ukraine.
He finished by saying: “I want to conclude by sending from here my prayers for the health of my friend Shimon Peres. My thoughts are with Israel’s ninth president Shimon Peres who is fighting for his life at these very moments. The president was a guest of honor in this house and a friend of the Ukrainian people, and saw the great importance of strengthening the ties between the states,” he said.
“In his last visit here, the ninth president worked to further the trade agreement between Israel and Ukraine, and to deepen the cooperation between the two states. In the name of the Israeli people, and people around the world we pray for his recovery.”
Opposition leader and Labor party head Isaac Herzog came to the hospital in the evening to bid farewell to Peres, who at one time
was the head of the Labor Party.
Interior Minister Arye Deri (Shas) and Rabbi of the Western Wall Shmuel Rabinovitch prayed and uttered psalms by Peres’s bedside on Tuesday. Close to tears, Deri told reporters afterwards: “We heard [from the doctors] of his serious and deteriorating condition and we are all praying. We are all used to seeing an active and intense Shimon.”