Farouk al-Shara, 1999 News

57, Israeli politician, was elected prime minister of Israel in a landslide victory in May over incumbent Benjamin Netanyahu. Barak immediately restarted talks with Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat and vowed to have solid Mideast peace plans in place by October 2000. In Dec. he took a monumental step toward peace with Syria when he met with Syria's foreign minister, Farouk al-Shara, in Washington.