Hillary Clinton risks Israeli wrath as she admits she’ll miss funeral of ex-PM and president Shimon Peres that she vowed to attend before her poll numbers crashed
Presidential candidate to send husband Bill while other world leaders will flock to state ceremony
US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has U-turned over her plan to attend the funeral of friend and former Israeli president Shimon Peres.
It was initially said after the ex-statesman's death on Tuesday that Mrs Clinton would pay her respects in person at the state funeral on Friday.
But husband and former president Bill Clinton will be going alone after cancelling rallies in Florida.
The Israeli government had said that both Mrs Clinton and Bill -- who worked with Peres during his time as Prime Minister in the 1990s -- would be able to make the commemoration.
But Hillary's campaign backed down from committing her attendance.
In a joint statement, the Clintons said they had "lost a true and treasured friend."
They described Peres -- who is best known for his work promoting peace with Palestine -- as someone "who championed its security, prosperity and limitless possibilities from its birth to his last day on earth".
Bill Clinton called him a "genius with a big heart who used his gifts to imagine a future of reconciliation not conflict, economic and social empowerment not anger and frustration, and a nation, a region, and a world enhanced by caring and sharing, not torn asunder by the illusions of permanent dominance and perfect truth.
"His critics called him a dreamer," Clinton said. "That he was - a lucid, eloquent dreamer until the very end. Thank goodness."
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The funeral will be attended by a host of leading figures including Barack Obama, Prince Charles and Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau.
Her decision not to attend comes as one poll put her and rival Donald Trump neck-and-neck in the final weeks before the election.
A Quinnipiac University survey posted before Monday's debate had Mrs Clinton edging her republican rival by just one point, reports.
Peres was president of the country from 2007 to 2014, served as prime minister, and won the Nobel peace prize for his role as one of the architects of the Oslo Peace Accords.
He retired from politics in 2014.
Doctors at the Tel Aviv hospital where he died said Peres suffered irreversible brain damage and severe organ failure caused by the massive stroke he sustained on September 13.
Peres was awarded the Nobel peace prize with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat for his role as Israel's foreign minister in setting up 1993's Oslo peace accords that saw the Israeli government recognise Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organisation as representative of the Palestinian people.
The accords also saw the PLO renounce terrorism and recognise Israel's right to exist in peace.
Reacting to news of Peres' death, US President Barack Obama said: "a light has gone out, but the hope he gave us will burn forever.
"Shimon Peres was a soldier for Israel, for the Jewish people, for justice, for peace, and for the belief that we can be true to our best selves — to the very end of our time on Earth, and in the legacy that we leave to others."
Peres was a leading figure in Israeli politics since the state's birth, and was considered by many to be the last surviving member of the its founding fathers.
As well as acting as serving as prime minister and president, he also served as minister of defence and foreign minister as part of a career spanning more than sixty years.
A light has gone out, but the hope he gave us will burn forever
Barack Obama
He joined the Haganah, predecessor to the modern-day Israeli Defence Forces in 1947 where he met Israel's founder and first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who put him in charge of acquiring weapons for the group.
Peres was head of naval services during Israel's war of independence in 1949, though he never officially served as a soldier in the country's military.
He worked in the defence department and was instrumental in setting up the country's nuclear programme until he was elected to Israel's parliament in 1959.
He was first made a minister in 1969 by then-PM Golda Meir.
He became unofficial acting prime minister after a scandal in 1977, before his first official spell from 1984 to 1986.
In 1993 when foreign minister he took part in secret negotiations with Arafat and the PLO, starting the process that eventually led to the Accords signed in 1993.
His final term followed the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin in 1995.
Peres only held office until 1996 when he was beaten at the polls by Benjamin Netanyahu, the current Prime Minister, following an upsurge in violence that derailed the peace process.
After narrowly losing the poll in 2000, Peres was elected as President in 2007.
He continued to work for peace for the rest of his career.
He was the first Israeli head of state to speak to a Muslim country's Parliament in 2007, and continued to call for further peace talks between the Israeli government and Palestinians.
In 2008 Peres received an honorary knighthood from the Queen, and in 2012 received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Barack Obama.
He is survived by three children, Tsivia, Yoni and Nehemia. His wife, Sonya, died in 2011.
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