Benjamin Netanyahu
Benjamin Netanyahu is the longest-serving prime minister in Israel's history, holding office from 1996 to 1999, 2009 to 2021, and again from December 2022. Born in Tel Aviv in 1949 to the historian Benzion Netanyahu, he spent much of his adolescence in Pennsylvania, and returned to serve five years in Sayeret Matkal, the special forces unit, taking part in the 1972 Sabena hijacking rescue and being wounded. His elder brother Yonatan was killed commanding the Entebbe rescue in 1976, an event that shaped both his politics and his public identity. He studied architecture and management at MIT, worked in consulting, and became deputy ambassador to Washington and then ambassador to the UN, where his fluent television English made him well known in America. He led Likud from 1993 and won in 1996, months after Yitzhak Rabin's assassination, having addressed rallies where Rabin was depicted in SS uniform. He signed the Hebron and Wye River agreements while opposing the Oslo framework, and lost in 1999. As finance minister from 2003 he cut welfare, taxes and public employment and privatised extensively, liberalising the economy substantially. He returned in 2009 and governed for twelve years, expanding settlements, opposing the Iran nuclear deal in a speech to Congress in 2015 over the president's objection, and signing the Abraham Accords with the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco in 2020. He was indicted for bribery, fraud and breach of trust in 2019, and his 2023 judicial overhaul brought hundreds of thousands into the streets. The Hamas attack of 7 October 2023 occurred on his watch, followed by the war in Gaza and an ICC warrant in November 2024.
- Lived: 1949 CE – ?
- Nationality: Israeli
- Roles: Prime Minister of Israel (1996-1999, 2009-2021, 2022-present)
