Benjamin Netanyahu

Politician; prime minister of Israel

• Born: October 21, 1949
• Place of Birth: Tel Aviv, Israel

Early Life and Family

In more than a half-century of conflict over the lands claimed by Israel and Palestine, only a handful of people have dominated international understandings of that complex issue. Benjamin Netanyahu—popularly nicknamed "Bibi"—played a role of immense significance, not merely in the decisions made by his country but also in the way other international leaders perceived the controversial stances adopted by the modern State of Israel.

Netanyahu was born in Tel Aviv, Israel, on October 21, 1949, but his history begins a year earlier. Raised as the middle child in a family of three boys, he was born the year after Zionist leaders announced the establishment of the State of Israel in the wake of a British evacuation of the area. Netanyahu’s parents, Ben-Zion (Benzion) and Cela (Tzilah) Netanyahu, were members of the New Zionist Organization (NZO), a group that believed the survival and well-being of Jewish people worldwide depended upon the Jewish community’s founding and leadership of its own political state. In the wake of World War II, as details of the Nazi effort to annihilate the world’s Jewish populations came to light, Western powers were inclined to support the Zionists’ efforts. Among those who worked extensively to gain the United States’ support for a Jewish state was V. Jabotinsky, founder of the NZO and mentor to the Netanyahus.

Athletic and intellectually gifted like his two brothers, Netanyahu was competitive and ambitious even as a child. He reportedly revered his older brother, Yoni. His mother, Cela, did most of the raising of the three boys, while their father, a Zionist and scholarly historian, tended to seclude himself in his study with his work. The boys were nonetheless steeped in their father’s complex understanding of Jewish history and Jewish vulnerability which could only be overcome through a brutally realistic approach to Zionist politics.

The family maintained a close connection to the United States. Cela’s parents had immigrated to what would become Israel in 1911 from their home in the United States, and the Netanyahus spent a year in the United States in 1957 and 1958 while Ben-Zion worked on his historical research.

In spite of his commitment to the new Jewish state, Ben-Zion Netanyahu moved his family to the United States in 1962, frustrated at his inability to secure a teaching position at Israel’s Hebrew University. A renowned scholar who had edited the Encyclopedia Judaica and the Hebrew Encyclopedia, Ben-Zion Netanyahu became convinced that the university refused to hire him because of his political activism. Benjamin Netanyahu spent his adolescent years in the United States, attending high school in Philadelphia, before going on to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for degrees in architecture and business administration.

Military Service

During the Netanyahu family’s stay in the United States, they frequently returned to Israel, but their ties to the fledgling state suddenly grew more significant in June 1964 when Netanyahu's older brother, Yoni (Yonatan), was drafted to his obligatory service in the Israeli military. After volunteering for the paratroopers, Yoni graduated first in his class from Officer’s Training School and ended up in the thick of escalating violence in the West Bank.

Since its founding in 1948, Israel has been in a recurring state of war. Palestinian refugees who had been displaced in the United Nations’ partition of Israel into a Jewish and Palestinian sector fought alongside Arab allies from surrounding countries who objected to the creation of a new, Western-backed and heavily armed Jewish state in their midst. Many of Israel’s leaders and intellectuals, like Ben-Zion Netanyahu, believed that the conflict was another attempt to annihilate Jewish people in the centuries-long history of discrimination and violence against Jews.

Yoni Netanyahu returned to the United States for college in 1967, the year that Benjamin Netanyahu began his own obligatory service. By May of that year, another large-scale war was unfolding between Israel and its neighbors. Benjamin Netanyahu volunteered for a special forces unit of the Israel Defense Forces and served for six years, taking part in some of the army’s most dangerous operations before being honorably discharged as a captain. In 1972, he returned to the United States and studied at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts; he graduated with a bachelor's degree in architecture in 1975 and a master's degree in business administration from the MIT Sloan School of Management in June 1976. Netanyahu also took a short break from his studies to return to Israel and fight in the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

As a reservist for the Israeli army, Yoni returned again to Israel during the heightened violence of the late 1960s and 1970s. He survived the Six-Day War in 1967 with an injury to his arm and returned to the army in 1968. This time, he did not survive. After earning accolades for his role in the 1972 Israeli capture of a group of Syrian officers, Yoni was killed in 1976 while participating in Operation Entebbe to rescue a group of Israelis whose own plane was hijacked to Uganda. Yoni became a national hero in Israel, but the personal loss to Netanyahu was tremendous.

In the wake of his brother’s death, Netanyahu left his employment with Boston Consulting Group, a Boston-based management consulting firm where he had worked from 1976 to 1978, to take a more active role in Israel. He took a management position with Rim Industries in Jerusalem but also began organizing international conferences on the issue of terrorism and lobbying for continued support for the Israeli state.

Netanyahu’s first conference took place in Jerusalem in 1979 and helped to secure him a position on Israel’s diplomatic mission to the United States in 1982. In 1984, Netanyahu was appointed ambassador to the United States and organized a second conference, this time in Washington, DC.

Political Career & Service

Netanyahu’s leadership potential became clear during the early 1980s. Articulate and well informed, he made a point of educating US policymakers on the strategic importance of Israel to its US ally, securing continued defense and economic aid for the Israeli state. His success and high-profile place in the media led him to seek political office after returning to Israel in 1988. In the footsteps of his parents and their mentor, Jabotinsky, Netanyahu ran for a seat in the Israeli Knesset (parliament) as a member of the right-wing Likud Party. He secured a seat in the Knesset and received the position of deputy minister of foreign affairs.

Netanyahu’s diplomatic skills proved crucial during his four-year post in foreign affairs. From 1987 to 1993, Palestinian refugees in the Israeli-controlled West Bank and Gaza Strip organized a loosely connected series of demonstrations, riots, and violent rebellions against Israeli authority known collectively as the Intifada, or “shaking off.” The Gulf War, begun with the US invasion of Iraq in 1991, further exacerbated tensions between the mix of religious and cultural groups that make up the Arab nations in the Middle East and North Africa and the Western-supported, officially Jewish, state of Israel. Netanyahu was called upon throughout to uphold Israel’s image with its Western allies and to work toward a negotiated peace between Israel and neighboring states.

Again, Netanyahu’s diplomatic skills earned him the popular support of his party. In 1993, Likud elected him its chair and its candidate for prime minister of Israel. A year prior, the Labour Party’s Yitzhak Rabin had been elected prime minister and had steered the country into a relatively conciliatory position toward Israel’s Arab neighbors. This brought about the 1993 Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestinian people, represented by the Palestine Liberation Organization’s (PLO) Yasir Arafat.

Many right-wing Israelis, including members of Likud, believed that these agreements were a betrayal of the Israeli state. In 1995, as the provisions of the agreement were being implemented, an Israeli man assassinated Prime Minister Rabin. The assassination, combined with the PLO’s struggle to control extremists within the Palestinian population, prompted Israeli retreat from some, though not all, of those provisions.

In 1996, Netanyahu won the direct elections for Israeli prime minister. He served as prime minister from 1996 until 1999, but his strained relations with fellow officials were a stark contrast to the skill with which he negotiated diplomatic relations. In addition, charges of corruption and incompetence began to plague his administration. As Netanyahu worked to move Israel’s economy toward increased privatization and less government social spending, it became clear that he would not hold the majority support of Israelis or of his party.

After losing his position as prime minister, Netanyahu recovered to claim the position of foreign minister in 2002. In February 2003, he became finance minister. He remained in the role until 2005, when he left government for a period due to disagreements with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon over details related to peace negotiations with the Palestinians. Netanyahu reclaimed the leadership of Likud after Sharon suffered a stroke in December 2005.

Likud fared poorly in the 2006 elections, but Netanyahu stayed on as party chairman and served as opposition leader. He was reelected party leader in 2007. In parliamentary elections held in February 2009, Likud placed second to Kadima, with each party earning over 20 percent of the vote. A coalition government was formed, and Netanyahu became prime minister of Israel for the second time in his career.

Much of Netanyahu’s second term as prime minister dealt with establishing renewed peace talks with Palestinian officials. In May 2009, he met with US secretary of state Hillary Clinton and US president Barack Obama to discuss Israeli development in the disputed territories. In September 2010, Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas held a one-on-one meeting with US envoy George Mitchell. Abbas and Netanyahu agreed to a schedule of peace talks.

Going into the 2013 elections, the Likud party merged with the Yisrael Beiteinu party, led by foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman. In the election, the coalition lost eleven seats but remained the largest faction in the Knesset, giving Netanyahu a third term as prime minister. In 2013, Netanyahu focused mainly on his policy of economic liberalization, overseeing the construction of private ports in Haifa and Ashdod and putting forth the monopoly-breaking Business Concentration Law, which was approved by the Knesset in December of that year. In 2014, the Palestinian military organization and political party Hamas joined with the Palestinian Authority to form a unity government, and Netanyahu began focusing on the condemnation of Hamas, which he called a terrorist organization. When three Israeli teenagers went missing in June 2014, Netanyahu launched an IDF operation meant to purge Hamas from the West Bank, which resulted in large-scale violence and civilian casualties on both sides. However, civilian casualties in that conflict were overwhelmingly Palestinian.

The relationship between Netanyahu and the White House also deteriorated in 2014. The United States had historically been a major supporter of Israel, but the US administration criticized Israeli expansion into territories claimed by Palestine, considering it illegal settlement activity. Netanyahu, meanwhile, claimed that criticism was “against American values” and showed a lack of understanding of the situation in the Middle East.

By 2015, shortly after being elected for a fourth term, Netanyahu had already announced his intention to run for a fifth term as prime minister in 2019. However, beginning in January 2017, it was revealed that he was being investigated by authorities regarding potential cases of corruption. In the first, Case 1000, he was suspected of accepting expensive gifts from Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan and Australian billionaire James Packer that could be considered bribes, and in the second, Case 2000, he was suspected of making a quid-pro-quo arrangement with Arnon Mozes, the publisher of Yediot Ahronot, one of Israel’s main newspapers, who was reportedly seeking aid in competing with a rival paper in exchange for favorable coverage of Netanyahu. By August, police had officially announced that Netanyahu had been named as a suspect in the cases of alleged fraud, bribery, and breach of trust; he denied the accusations. In February 2018, Israeli police recommended that the prime minister be indicted on the charges. On March 2, 2018, Netanyahu and his spouse, Sara Netanyahu, were questioned in a third corruption case, Case 4000, regarding a quid-pro-quo arrangement with the owners of Bezeq Israel Telecom.

Netanyahu’s relationship with the US government improved with the election of President Donald Trump, with whom he shared personal ties and whose supporters were pro-Israel and pro-Likud. Netanyahu had a longstanding friendship with Charles Kushner, the father of Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner; the Kushners were Orthodox Jews whose family charity donated to Israeli settler groups. Trump had also endorsed Netanyahu’s third run for prime minister, recording a 2013 campaign video praising Netanyahu as a strong and respected leader. Although Trump asked Netanyahu to “hold back” on settlements when the two leaders met in February 2017, Trump stopped US discussions with the Palestinians and retreated from the United States’ efforts to seek a two-state solution. Netanyahu praised Trump for recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in December 2017, for pulling the United States out of the Iran Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in early May 2018, and for moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem on May 14, 2018. Trump’s actions angered Palestinians, triggered protests in Gaza, and were widely condemned around the world, including by the United Nations General Assembly.

In February 2019, Israel's attorney general announced that he intended to indict Netanyahu on charges of fraud, bribery, and breach of trust. Despite this announcement, which gave additional support to his most competitive opponent, former army leader Benny Gantz, Netanyahu claimed victory in securing a fifth term as prime minister in the country's elections on April 9, 2019. Only a few weeks later, he ordered retaliatory strikes against militant targets in Gaza after hundreds of rockets had been fired into Israel in a period of increased conflict. A tentative cease-fire was ultimately reached following that outbreak of violence. However, by the end of May, a new election was called as Netanyahu had unprecedentedly proven unable, as the designated prime minister, to negotiate a coalition government and parliament had been dissolved. After a second election in September, Netanyahu was once again unable to get enough parliamentary support for a coalition, and when Gantz was then given the opportunity, he also announced that he had failed to form a coalition. Meanwhile, Netanyahu was formally indicted on the charges against him in November 2019, making him the first sitting Israeli prime minister to face criminal charges.

A third close election then occurred in March 2020, just as further tension began to be added to the political situation in Israel by the rise of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) global pandemic. In an attempt to answer pleas for governmental stability to combat the pandemic, Netanyahu and Gantz ultimately announced the formation of an emergency unity government in April, with the two men sharing power through rotation in the role of prime minister and their parties sharing government positions. It was agreed that Netanyahu would serve as prime minister first, and he continued to lead despite the beginning of his trial in May. As the trial experienced delays due in part to the pandemic, the fragile unity government ultimately came to an end after a failure to agree on a budget led to the automatic dissolution of parliament in December. In February 2021, Netanyahu pleaded not guilty to the charges of corruption, amid ongoing protests of the prime minister regarding both the charges and his administration's handling of the pandemic.

After a fourth election was held in March 2021, the Israeli election authority's release of the final results indicated that Netanyahu as well as opposition parties had once again proven unable to secure a parliamentary majority. Then, in June 2021, a politically diverse alliance narrowly succeeded in forming a coalition government united mainly by the goal of removing Netanyahu from power. On June 13, Naftali Bennett of the small, right-wing political party Yamina was sworn in as Israel's new prime minister (to be succeeded by centrist politician Yair Lapid in two years, as part of a power-sharing agreement), ending Netanyahu's record-setting twelve-year leadership of the country. Netanyahu remained the head of Likud and took over the role of leader of the opposition.

Netanyahu's criminal trial continued throughout 2021 and 2022. Meanwhile, despite his ouster from the prime minister post, Netanyahu's party, Likud, was still the largest party in the Knesset at that time, and Netanyahu continued to serve in the government as leader of the opposition. Despite the dramatic end of his tenure as prime minister, Netanyahu did not remain out of power for long. Bennett's coalition government ultimately dissolved in June 2022 amid a number of setbacks; at that point the Israeli government announced it would hold another legislative election in November 2022.

During the legislative election, which was held on November 1, a coalition of far-right parties came together under the leadership of Netanyahu and his allies in Likud; this coalition was able to win a slight majority of sixty-four seats out of the 120 seats in the Knesset. After this electoral victory, at the end of December 2022, Netanyahu was sworn in as the prime minister of a new coalition government. As he organized a new government and appointed new ministers, some of these appointees were subjected to intense criticism, including finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, whose inflammatory comments had led to accusations of Islamophobia, racism, and homophobia.

While many Likud supporters embraced Netanyahu's return to power, his political comeback upset many others in Israel and triggered many protests across the country, many of which focused on Netanyahu's plans to reform Israel's judicial system. As Netanyahu's government pursued a number of reforms intended to reduce judicial oversight of the country's legislative processes throughout the first several months of 2023, his actions drew significant international criticism and even provoked opposition among some of Netanyahu's supporters. For example, in March 2023, Israel's minister of defense, Yoav Gallant, who had long been a close ally of Netanyahu, spoke out against the reform and was removed from his post the following day. Other unprecedented protests also took place; for example, 2023 saw multiple instances of fighter pilots in the Israeli military refusing to participate in drills and other activities, despite the Israeli military's traditionally neutral approach to politics.

Despite intense opposition, the Knesset passed judicial reform in July 2023, marking a major political victory for Netanyahu. While this had been Netanyahu's biggest priority—as well as one of the biggest points of contention for his critics—for most of 2023, his government also enacted a number of other policies during that time, including approval for construction of new settlements in the West Bank. This official endorsement of increased Israeli settlement in areas legally considered Palestinian increased tensions between Israel and Palestine, which had already flared into open conflict multiple times in the early 2020s.

These tensions erupted into open warfare in early October 2023, when militants led by Hamas, at that time the leading political party in the Gaza Strip, attacked multiple military and civilian targets in Israeli territory. More than one thousand Israeli citizens were killed, and more than two hundred soldiers and civilians were kidnapped during the October 7 surprise attack. Hamas's actions, which Netanyahu referred to as an act of war, led the Israeli government to formally declare war for the first time since the 1973 Yom Kippur War. As prime minister, Netanyahu played a leading role in overseeing the war effort, which included offensive operations and air strikes conducted by the IDF in response to the attacks, as well as the application of a total blockade against the Gaza Strip. Within days of the conflict starting, more than 800 Israelis and nearly 600 Palestinians had been killed, making it one of the deadliest outbreaks of violence in decades. The beginning of the conflict also led several groups to suspend their protests against Netanyahu's government.

In May 2024, The New York Times reported that prosecutors at the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced they were requesting arrest warrants for both Netanyahu and Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, on charges of crimes against humanity. The prosecutors’ request followed a continuation of the conflict between Israel and Hamas that, by that time, had lasted for seven months and resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of Gazan civilians. By the one-year anniversary of the Hamas attack, more than 1,200 people had been killed in Israel and about 8,700 had been injured. Deaths included about 800 civilians, 346 soldiers, and 66 police officers. In Gaza, the death toll was more than 41,700, and about 96,700 had been injured. The United Nations estimated at least 10,000 more people whose bodies had not been found under debris were also dead.

Israel and Hamas negotiated some exchanges of hostages and prisoners. By October 3, 2024, one hundred and twelve hostages had been swapped and the bodies of thirty-seven others had been recovered. Ninety-seven hostages remained in Gaza; officials believed at least one-third were dead.

Israel was also engaged in warfare with Iran in 2024. In April, Netanyahu ordered the bombing of a building in Damascus, Syria, in the Iranian diplomatic compound. Iran launched attacks on Israel that the United States helped repel. The bombs killed multiple people, including two Iranian generals. Netanyahu ordered an air strike on Beirut, Lebanon, to assassinate a top Hezbollah military commander, Fuad Shukr, in July. Drone and missile attacks between Israel and Hezbollah and its allies were ongoing while Israel continued its war with Hamas.

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