Madeleine Albright, Bob Dylan, Shimon Peres and Jan Karski will be among 13 recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

The list was released Thursday. President Obama had previously announced that he was set to confer the medal on Peres, the Israeli president, and Karski, the late Polish resistance fighter who was among the first to document the Nazi genocide.

Among Albright’s contributions, the White House said in announcing the medal recipients, she “helped lead the Alliance’s campaign against terror and ethnic cleansing in the Balkans, pursued peace in the Middle East and Africa, sought to reduce the dangerous spread of nuclear weapons, and was a champion of democracy, human rights, and good governance across the globe.”

Forwarding the News

Thoughtful, balanced reporting from the Forward and around the web, bringing you updated news and analysis each day.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

Albright learned from a reporter in 1997 that her parents had hid their Jewishness from her. The revelation came just as she was set to be named President Bill Clinton’s secretary of state.

She is now writing a book tracing the Jewish heritage of her parents and the fate of 25 relatives she lost in the Holocaust. In a Washington Post interview on Thursday, she likened the revelation of her Jewish past just as she was preparing to become the first female secretary of state to being handed a gift to unwrap just as she started a marathon.

Dylan, a singer-songwriter, transformed rock and folk music in the 1960s by fusing the sensibilities of the two genres.

The White House release said Dylan was “known for his rich and poetic lyrics,” and “his work had considerable influence on the civil rights movement of the 1960s and has had significant impact on American culture over the past five decades.”

Karski, who died in 2000, “carried among the first eyewitness accounts of the Holocaust to the world,” the White House said, and Peres “has strengthened the unbreakable bonds between Israel and the United States.”

The medals will be given out this summer on a date yet to be determined.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

$90 $180

$360

Other amount