Personal Life
Born in Jerusalem, Navon is a descendant of a Sephardi family of rabbis. On his father's side, he is descended from Spanish Jews who settled in Turkey after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492. The family (Baruch Mizrahi family or Al Mashraki) moved to Jerusalem in 1670. On his mother's side, he is descended from the renowned kabbalist Haim Ben Attar. The Ben-Atar family came from Morocco to Jerusalem in 1884.
Navon studied Hebrew literature and Islamic studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. After serving in the Haganah in Jerusalem, he was sent by the Israeli foreign service to Uruguay and Argentina. Navon's wife Ofira, many years his junior, died of cancer. They had two children.
Read more about this topic: Yitzhak Navon
Famous quotes containing the words personal and/or life:
“Behind all their personal vanity, women themselves always have an impersonal contempt—for “woman.””
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“The word career is a divisive word. It’s a word that divides the normal life from business or professional life.”
—Grace Paley (b. 1922)