Royal breakup
Silvan and Judy Shalom Nir Mozes are done
They came from different backgrounds and lived their individual life styles during 24 years of marriage, but now it looks as if 59 is the cut-off age for radio and television personality Judy Shalom Nir Mozes, an heiress to the Yediot Aharonot newspaper group, and former vice prime minister Silvan Shalom, who were both born in the same year – he in Tunis, she in Tel Aviv. The couple has reportedly decided to divorce.
The super glamorous Judy, who does not look her age, and certainly doesn’t look like the mother of five children, married Silvan in 1993. The sister of Yediot’s publisher Arnon Mozes, she was a young widow with two sons, Nimrod and Nadav, from her first marriage to Amiram Nir, a journalist turned counterterrorism adviser, who was killed in a mysterious plane crash in Mexico in 1988. As far as is known, he was heavily involved in the Iran-Contra deal.
Silvan had become a member of Knesset the year before his marriage. He had never been married before, but he had been orphaned as a child when his father was murdered. Thus, both the bride and groom had known tragedy, and the groom was very happy to enter a ready-made family and to become a father to Judy’s sons. Another three children were born – Shira, and the twins Tomer and Alon.
To all intents and purposes, they were a very united family, living in the home in which Judy and her siblings had been raised in Ramat Gan.
Silvan’s career took off like an express train after his marriage. He held several ministerial positions including vice premier, finance minister and foreign minister. He would have liked to be prime minister and challenge Benjamin Netanyahu for the Likud leadership. Despite the fact that he had a very large following, he could not beat Bibi, and subscribing to ‘if you can’t beat them join them’ he pledged his loyalty to Netanyahu.
Then he decided that if he could not be prime minister, he would have a shot at becoming president. Either he forgot about having sexually assaulted a former female aide, or what she told police was not true. She did wait 16 years before letting the cat out of the bag, saying that after president Moshe Katsav had been sentenced to prison for rape, she could not allow another sex offender to become citizen number one.
Silvan denied the charge, but backed out of the race. Other accusations of sexual harassment followed, and in December 2015, he kissed his political career goodbye and resigned from the Knesset.
Both he and Judy issued denials about his alleged sexual misconduct but the rumor mill was busy, and there was not much they could do to silence it.
Then the tone of the rumor mill changed and there was speculation as to how long it would take for the marriage to fall asunder. There were some who believed that the relationship went downhill after he stopped being a politician, and others who attributed the marital crisis to Judy constantly wondering how much truth there was in the allegations of sexual improprieties.
A friend of the couple says that even though the marriage has collapsed, the two still live in the same house and have remained friends.
That could mean that they are just being very civilized or that they are giving themselves a chance to work things out in the hope that they can get the marriage back on track.
Had he not set his sights on the presidency, Silvan would have saved himself a big headache. If he and Judy still love each other, this may be just a crack and not a break.