TEL AVIV (Dispatches) -- Avi Har-Even, a former head of the Israel Space Agency, has succumbed to injuries he sustained during violence between Jews and Arabs in the city of Acre.
Har-Even, 84, died in the Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa on Sunday night, the Times of Israel reported Monday.
He had been hospitalized after suffering from burns and severe smoke inhalation when the Efendi Hotel he was staying at in Acre was set on fire last month.
The arson attack came amid the clashes that led up to and continued through the 11-day Israeli aggression on the besieged Gaza Strip.
Weeks of Israeli harassment of Palestinians in Jerusalem Al-Quds and attempts to appropriate Palestinian lands in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood were followed by the Israeli bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip.
The Israeli aggression on Gaza, which began on May 10, martyred over 260 Palestinians and wounded more than 1,900 others, before a ceasefire came into effect on May 21.
Har-Even began his long military career in the Israeli military’s Artillery Corps.
After receiving a degree in electrical engineering at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, he served as an officer heading artillery research development.
He held various research and development positions and headed a group that was awarded the Israel Prize.
In 1982, he worked for the Israel Aerospace Industries, and served as the head of the Israel Space Agency between 1995 and 2004.