(Binyamin "Bibi" Netanyahu, born October 21 1949, Tel Aviv) was the 9th Prime Minister of Israel and is Chairman of the Likud Party. As leader of the conservative Likud party, he was Prime Minister from June 1996 to July 1999. He is the first (and to date only) Prime Minister of Israel to be born after the State of Israel's foundation. He was Finance Minister of Israel until August 9, 2005, having resigned in protest at the Gaza Disengagement Plan advocated by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Netanyahu retook the Likud leadership on December 20, 2005. As of December 2006, he became the official leader of the Opposition in the Knesset and Chairman of the Likud Party. In August 2007 he retained the Likud leadership by beating Moshe Feiglin in party elections.

Family and personal background

Netanyahu was born in Tel Aviv, to Cela (Tsilah) (née Segal) and Benzion Netanyahu (original name Mileikowsky). His mother was also born in 1912 in Petach Tikvah in what would become Israel. Though all his grandparents were born in Lithuania, his mother's parents immigrated from Minneapolis, in the US. Netanyahu's father (Benzion Netanyahu) is a professor of Jewish history, currently listed as a professor emeritus at Cornell University although the elder Netanyahu has remained active into his 90s in research and writing, a former editor of the Hebrew Encyclopedia, and a former senior aide to Zeev Jabotinsky. When he was 14 years old, his family moved to the United States and settled in Cheltenham Township, Pennsylvania, a Philadelphia suburb, where he graduated from Cheltenham High School. Netanyahu's older brother Yonatan was killed in Uganda during Operation Entebbe in 1976. His younger brother Iddo is a radiologist and writer. All three brothers served in the Sayeret Matkal reconnaissance unit, Benjamin Netanyahu from 1967 to 1973. He earned a B.S. degree in Architecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1975, and an M.S. degree from the MIT Sloan School of Management in 1977, and has studied political science at Harvard and MIT. After graduate school, Netanyahu worked at The Boston Consulting Group in Boston, Massachusetts, and eventually returned to Israel. He has authored several books, including two on fighting terrorism. Netanyahu has a daughter, Noa, from his first marriage to Micki Weizman. His second marriage was to Fleur Cates, who converted to Judaism (only her father was a Jew). He is now married to his third wife, Sarah, with whom he has two sons, Yair and Avner.

After a brief career in business, Netanyahu was appointed Deputy Chief of Mission at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. in 1982. Subsequently, he became Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations, serving from 1984 to 1988. He was elected to the Knesset in 1988 and served in the governments led by Yitzhak Shamir from 1988 to 1992. Shamir retired from politics shortly after Likud's defeat in the 1992 elections. In 1993, for the first time, the party held a primary election to select its leader, and Netanyahu was victorious, defeating Benny Begin, son of the late Prime Minister Menachem Begin, and veteran politician David Levy. (Ariel Sharon initially sought the Likud leadership as well, but quickly withdrew when it was evident that he was attracting minimal support.)

Prime minister (1996-1999)

In 1996, for the first time, Israelis elected their Prime Minister directly. Netanyahu hired American Republican political operative Arthur Finkelstein to run his campaign, and although the American style of sound bites and sharp attacks elicited harsh criticism from inside Israel, it proved effective (ironically, the method was later copied by Ehud Barak during the 1999 election campaign in which he beat Netanyahu). Netanyahu won the election, surprising many by beating the pre-election favourite Shimon Peres. The main catalyst in the downfall of the latter was a wave of suicide bombings shortly before the elections; on March 3 and 4, 1996, Palestinians carried out two suicide bombings, killing 32 Israelis, with Peres seemingly unable to stop the attacks. Unlike Peres, Netanyahu did not trust Yasser Arafat and conditioned any progress at the peace process on the Palestinian Authority fulfilling its obligations - mainly fighting terrorism, and ran with the campaign slogan "Netanyahu - making a safe peace". However, although Netanyahu won the election for Prime Minister, Labor won the Knesset elections, beating the Likud-Gesher-Tzomet alliance, meaning Netanyahu had to rely on a coalition with the Ultra-orthodox parties, Shas and UTJ (whose social welfare policies flew in the face of his capitalistic outlook) in order to govern.

As Prime Minister, Netanyahu negotiated with Yasser Arafat in the form of the Wye River Accords (1998). No progress was made regarding negotiations with the Palestinians, and although they failed to implement agreed-upon steps of the Oslo Accords, Netanyahu turned over most of Hebron to Palestinian jurisdiction. In 1996, Netanyahu and Jerusalem's mayor Ehud Olmert decided to open an exit for the Western Wall Tunnel. This sparked three days of rioting by Palestinians, resulting in both Israelis and Palestinians being killed.

As Prime Minister Netanyahu emphasized a policy of "three no(s)": no withdrawal from Golan Heights, no discussion of the case of Jerusalem, no negotiations under any preconditions.

Netanyahu was opposed by the political left wing in Israel and also lost support from the right because of his concessions to the Palestinians in Hebron and elsewhere, and due to his negotiations with Arafat generally. After a long chain of scandals (including gossip regarding his marriage) and an investigation opened against him on charges of corruption (later acquitted), Netanyahu lost favor with the Israeli public.

After being defeated by Ehud Barak in the 1999 election for Prime Minister, Netanyahu temporarily retired from politics.

Political activity after 2000

In 2001, Netanyahu missed the opportunity to return to power since he refused to run unless there were general elections, a move that facilitated Sharon's entry into the race for Prime Minister. In 2002, after the Labour Party left the coalition and vacated the position of foreign minister, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon appointed Netanyahu as Foreign Minister. Netanyahu challenged Sharon for the leadership of the Likud party, but failed to oust Sharon. After the 2003 elections, Netanyahu accepted the post of Finance Minister in a newly formed Sharon coalition. Netanyahu did not support the concept of a future Palestinian state, though on two occasions in 2001, he indicated willingness to consider the idea.

As Finance Minister, Netanyahu undertook an economic plan in order to restore Israel's economy from its low point during the al-Aqsa Intifada. The plan involved a move toward more liberalized markets, although it was not without its critics. Netanyahu succeeded in passing several long-in-the-queue reforms, including an important reform in the banking system that followed with a significant increase in the GDP growth rate. However, opponents in the Labor party (and a few even with his own Likud) viewed Netanyahu's policies as "Thatcherite" attacks on the venerated Israeli social safety net. Likud's defeat in the 2006 elections is seen by many observers as a collective Israeli rejection of these policies.

Netanyahu threatened to resign in 2004 unless the Gaza pullout plan was put to a referendum, but later lifted the ultimatum. He submitted his resignation letter on August 7, 2005, shortly before the Israeli cabinet voted 17 to 5 to approve the initial phase of withdrawals of the Gaza Disengagement Plan. Netanyahu's resignation went into effect August 9, 2005, two days after he submitted his letter. Shortly thereafter he revealed he had rejected an invitation to serve as Italy's finance minister, allegedly extended to him by Italian billionaire businessman Carlo De Benedetti, who later said it was a joke.

Following the withdrawal of Ariel Sharon from the Likud, Netanyahu was one of several candidates who vied for the Likud leadership. His most recent attempt prior to this was in September 2005 when he tried to hold early primaries for the position of the head of the Likud party, while the party held the office of Prime Minister - thus effectively pushing Ariel Sharon out of office. The party rejected this initiative. Netanyahu retook the leadership on December 20, 2005, with 47% of the primary vote. In the March 2006 Knesset elections, Likud took the third place behind Kadima and Labor. Netanyahu is currently Leader of the Opposition.

On August 14, 2007, Netanyahu was reelected as chairman of the Likud and its candidate to the post of Prime Minister with 73% of the vote against far-right candidate Moshe Feiglin and World Likud Chairman Danny Danon.

On July 31, 2008, Netanyahu, as Likud party leader, called for snap polls, since Ehud Olmert's successor as Kadima leader would not automatically be the prime minister: "This government has reached an end ... it doesn't matter who heads Kadima. They are all partners in this government's total failure. National responsibility requires a return to the people and new elections. Israeli law requires dissolution of the current government and formation of a coalition by the new leader before taking over. Olmert plans to be a caretaker until formation of new government.

Response to Iran

Strongly against Iran's pursuit of uranium enrichment, Netanyahu said "[i]t’s 1938, and Iran is Germany, and Iran is racing to arm itself with atomic bombs”. In a March 8, 2007 interview with CNN, he asserted that there is only one difference between Nazi Germany and the Islamic Republic of Iran, namely that the first entered a worldwide conflict and then sought atomic weapons, while the latter is first seeking atomic weapons and, once it has them, will then start a world war.

Netanyahu repeated these remarks at a news conference in April, 2008, stating that "where that [Nazi] regime embarked on a global conflict before it developed nuclear weapons," he said. "This regime [Iran] is developing nuclear weapons before it embarks on a global conflict."

Books and articles

Books:

• A Durable Peace: Israel and Its Place Among the Nations (Warner Books, 2000) ISBN 0-446-52306-2
• Fighting Terrorism: How Democracies Can Defeat Domestic And International Terrorism (Diane Pub Co, 1995) ISBN 0-7881-5514-8
• A Place Among the Nations (Bantam, 1993) ISBN 0-553-08974-9
• Terrorism: How the West Can Win (Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1986) ISBN 0-374-27342-1

Articles:

• "On Terrorism"

References

• Clinton, Bill (2005). My Life. Vintage. ISBN 1-4000-3003-X.

External links

• Benyamin Netanyahu's Blog - Netanyahu's Official Blog and Videoblog.
• Netanyahu.com - Netanyahu's Unofficial Blog.
• Biography of Benjamin Netanyahu at Zionism and Israel Information Center Biography Section
• Website of supporters of Benjamin Netanyahu: Hebrew
• Benjamin Netanyahu on the definition of terror (BBC)(5 min.)
• Benjamin Netanyahu Profile on Israeli Lexicon (Ynetnews | Yedioth Aharonoth)
• Netanyahu: Pullout will worsen Israel's security The Jerusalem Post, August 5, 2005
• Cheltenham High School Hall of Fame Biography
• Netanyahu’s Fortification Plan