Peleg was raised in
Ramat-Gan. He joined the
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in 1976 and served as a paratrooper until his enrollment into medics' course. He completed his officer's training and was promoted as a medical organization officer. Peleg served in a number of positions in the
Medical Corps of the IDF, including chief instructor at the IDF's medical training school and commander of the training facility of the Medical Corps. During the
First Gulf War, he served as the head of the medicine branch at the civil defense directorate (nowadays:
Home Front Command) and was tasked with overseeing the medical operations at the home front. Between 1997 and 1998, while in uniforms, he was lent to the
Ministry of Health to serve as a senior consultant to the Minister, as well as a board member of
Magen David Adom (Israel's Emergency Medical Services). Between 1998 and 2001 he was the commander of the IDF's Medical Training School. During this period he was tasked with the medical management of many
mass casualty incidents throughout Israel. He was discharged from military service as an Army Colonel. Peleg holds a
Bachelor's degree in politics, sociology and psychology from
Bar-Ilan University, a
Master's degree in public health with emphasis on health management from The
Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (Bethesda, Maryland), and a
PhD in Health Administration and Policy from
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. Following his discharge from the IDF, he established the National Center for Trauma & Emergency Medicine Research at Gertner Institute. The center deals with the study of injury in Israel and abroad and is considered one of the leading research centers in the field of injury epidemiology, specifically in the field of mass casualty and terrorism. The center is also serving as the home of national trauma registry of Israel, which was established in 1995 by Vita Barell. Since its establishment, the center has published close to 200 papers in leading medical journals In 2005, Peleg co-established the Master's Program for Emergency and Disaster Management at Tel-Aviv University. In 2010, the program was expanded to include an international equivalent for foreign students. Since their establishment, these programs qualified hundreds of alumni who were incorporated into emergency management and humanitarian relief work in Israel and elsewhere. In 2008, he was appointed as an expert by the
United Nations Disaster Assessment and Coordination, a
UN agency for international emergency response for sudden-onset emergencies. In parallel, he was tasked by the
World Health Organization to serve as a mentor in the verification process of emergency medical teams responding to disaster-stricken regions. In 2017, he was elected chairperson of the board of directors of the World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine. In addition, he holds several positions as board member in national and international committees, such as the Israeli National Committee for Mass Casualty Management. == Research contributions ==