Former Israeli president and Nobel laureate treated in intensive care after suffering major stroke.
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“We call on all of Israel to join us in hoping and praying for his recovery”, Walden said.
Mr Peres suffered a stroke in the right side of the brain and was ventilated and sedated.
In the first instance, the hospital said he had suffered a “mild cardiac event” and underwent catheterisation to widen an artery.
FILE – In this November 2, 2015 file photo, former Israeli President Shimon Peres speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in Jerusalem.
In a statement, President Reuven Rivlin said he was “following with concern the updates from the hospital, and pray together with the entire people for my friend Shimon’s recovery”.
Speaking to reporters outside the hospital, Dr. Itzik Kreiss said the hospital would hold a press conference in the afternoon to brief the public on Peres’ condition.
“I am pleased to say that he understands what is being said to him, is responsive, and even warmly squeezed my hand”.
Mr Peres has held nearly every major political office since Israel was founded in 1948, and was the architect of Israel’s secret nuclear programme.
He had remained active since completing his seven-year term as president in 2014, refusing to bow into retirement.
The elder statesman is one of Israel’s most admired symbols and the last of its founding fathers. In the video, he appears tired but is otherwise alert and coherent.
He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 for his role negotiating the Oslo peace accords with the Palestinians a year earlier, a prize he shared with Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was later assassinated, and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
Mr Peres is known to maintain a healthy lifestyle and has long prided himself on his longevity and stamina.
Peres needed to be sedated last night for the doctors to better proceed with medical treatment yet his condition has improved to the point where the doctors have lowered the dosage of anesthetics.
Long a divisive figure in Israeli politics, Peres finally became one of Israel’s most popular public figures in his later years. “He became a historic figure, larger than politics, larger than everyday affairs, a figure in a league of his own”, wrote Nahum Barnea, a columnist for the Israeli daily, Yediot Ahronot.
Concern has mounted over the condition of Mr Peres, widely respected as a statesman both in Israel and overseas, after his stroke on Tuesday.
“Shimon, we love you and the entire nation is wishing for your recovery”, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted.
Netanyahu said on his Twitter account: “Shimon, we all love you”.
Beyond his accomplishments in the public eye, Peres was also seen as a driving force in the development of Israel’s undeclared nuclear programme. But he warned that it was far too soon to eulogise his tenacious father.
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Zeev Feldman, president of the Israeli Neurosurgical Association and involved in Peres’ treatment, told AFP “the fact that he regained consciousness gives us some cautious optimism”.
