MANILA, Philippines – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared war on Hamas after the Palestinian Islamist group launched a surprise attack on Israel, starting a conflict that has so far affected thousands from both sides.

As of Sunday, October 29, at least 8,005 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza while more than 1,400 Israelis have been killed, with thousands injured. The casualty toll is expected to rise as violence continues.

The Israeli front is led by 74-year-old Netanyahu, who also has been the subject of protests and controversies in his home country prior to the conflict.

But who is Netanyahu? What do we need to know about him?

Netanyahu’s US years

Netanyahu was born in 1949 in Tel Aviv, Israel’s largest metropolitan area that serves as its “hub for innovation, culture, and creativity.” He grew up in Jerusalem, but studied in a Pennsylvania high school in the United States where his historian father Benzion taught and did research in a nearby university.

He returned to Israel in 1967 after graduating from high school to enlist with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Israelis are required to join the military service when they turn 18 years old, with men serving for 32 months and women for 24. During his time at the IDF, Netanyahu served in the Sayeret Matkal, considered to be one of the special units that focuses on intelligence gathering.

Netanyahu went back to the US in 1972 to study architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), but had to return to his home country when the Yom Kippur War between Israel and Arab states broke out in 1973. He eventually finished his degree after the war, and even obtained a business management masters from MIT in 1976.

Rise in politics

Netanyahu did not immediately enter politics after he obtained his degrees. Starting 1976, he worked in business consulting in the US before returning to Israel in 1978 to run a non-government organization honoring his brother Jonathan, who was killed during one rescue mission in the military. 

He was appointed deputy chief of mission at the Israeli embassy in the US in 1982, and served as Israel’s ambassador to the UN from 1984 to 1988. 

After his stint at the UN, Netanyahu was elected to parliament under the Likud Party, considered the “largest right-wing party” in Israel. He became the party chairperson in 1993, making him the leading opposition lawmaker then.

While working his way up, Netanyahu also becamse deputy foreign affairs minister from 1988 to 1993 before serving as deputy minister from 1991 to 1992. 

Opposing withdrawing from occupied lands

Netanyahu has always been opposed to Israel losing control over Palestinian land. He was against the Oslo Accords and has been very vocal against the withdrawal of Israeli forces from occupied lands, such as the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. 

It was, however, under his watch as prime minister that Israel withdrew its forces from parts of the West Bank. In 1998, Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat signed an agreement that tackled Palestinian rule in the West Bank, with Israel still handling security. Arafat, during the signing, said that “whatever we achieved is only temporary and has been late,” according to a Washington Post article. 

This was seen by many opposing Palestinian self-autonomy as compromise with Palestine, leading to Netanyahu losing support from his own party. His term ended in 1999. 

Netanyahu then worked in the private sector before returning to politics to become foreign affairs minister from 2002 to 2003 and then finance minister from 2003 to 2005. 

He quit his Cabinet post in 2005 when the Israeli government decided to withdraw forces from the Gaza Strip, a coastal enclave that has been the scene of violence throughout the conflict. In his resignation letter, Netanyahu said he cannot support “a decision which threatens state security,” according to a report by Al Jazeera.

It did not take long before Netanyahu rose to prominence again. By December, the same year he resigned from the Cabinet, he was elected party leader, and in 2007 was reelected as a lawmaker. 

He became Israeli prime minister again in 2009 and served for 12 years until June 2021 after losing to Naftali Bennett, a leader of another right-wing Yamina party. 

But a little over a year later, in December 2022, Netanyahu reclaimed his seat as prime minister, cementing his position as the longest-serving leader of Israel. A CNN report tagged Netanyahu’s then-incoming Cabinet as the “likely to be the country’s most right-wing government in history.” 

Personal and political controversies

Controversies and scandals have always followed Netanyahu both in his personal and political life. 

He had been accused of having extramarital affairs at the beginning of his political career. In 1993, Netanyahu publicly admitted one affair on television but not without accusing a partymate of blackmailing him, according to a Washington Post article. 

Meanwhile, Netanyahu’s third wife Sara has been sued by a former housekeeper for abuse. In 2019, Sara was convicted of “fraudulently using state funds for meals,” for falsely claiming that there was no cook available in the official residence. She used this to justify paying $100,000 (85,000 euros) for meals.

Netanyahu has also been accused of influence-peddling and corruption. In 2017, he was suspected of receiving benefits from businessmen. In 2018, he was questioned by authorities for allegedly exchanging regulatory benefits in exchange for favorable media coverage

In 2020, Netanyahu was indicted on three separate corruption charges – he was accused of “fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes,” spanning cigars, champagne, and jewelry worth almost 180,000 euros. At the start of the trial in May 2020, Netanyahu tagged the charges as “fabricated and ludicrous.”

Netanyahu was the subject of widespread protests between 2020 and 2021 over his corruption scandals. His government, specifically his police force, was also accused of using Pegasus spyware to gather intelligence on leading protesters.

The spyware was developed by the NSO Group, an Israeli company that was hoping for Netanyahu’s electoral victory, according to a December 2022 report by the Financial Times. – Rappler.com