Leaving public office in 1975, two years later he created the Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, which he headed until his death.

Aharon ("Aharale") Rabinovich (later Yariv) was born in Moscow in the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.

He began his military service in the Haganah in 1938,[1] and later served as an officer in the British Army during World War II.

During the Yom Kippur War of 1973 he was appointed as a special assistant to the IDF chief of staff and at the end of the war led the Israeli military delegation at the Kilometer 101 ceasefire talks with Egypt's General Mohamed Abdel Ghani el-Gamasy which endeavoured to bring about a military disengagement treaty.

In March 1979 he concluded the PLO had failed to disrupt normal life, halt immigration or deter tourism.