Netanyahu: The Early Years
Benjamin Netanyahu, referred to by many as “Bibi,” was born in Tel Aviv in 1949. By 1963, his family had moved to Pennsylvania, where he attended high school.
At the age of 18, Netanyahu was drafted into the Israeli military, serving in Sayeret Matkal, an elite special operations unit. Over the next few years, he took part in several counter-terrorism missions, notably aiding in rescuing a hijacked plane at the Tel Aviv airport in 1972.
From 1972-76, Netanyahu attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he received a Bachelor of Science in Architecture and a Master’s in Business Management.
After his brother, Jonathan, was tragically killed in action while rescuing hostages from German leftist and Palestinian terrorists in Entebbe, Uganda in 1976, Netanyahu started an anti-terrorism foundation known as the Jonathan Institute. By 1982, Netanyahu had become a well-known public figure, serving as Israel’s deputy chief of mission in Washington, D.C. He became Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations in 1984.
In 1988, Netanyahu was elected to the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, for the first time as a member of the right-wing Likud party. He served as deputy minister of foreign affairs until 1991, when he became deputy minister in then-prime minister Yitzhak Shamir’s office.
Continuing to gain traction, Netanyahu was elected chairman of the Likud party in 1993.
Netanyahu’s First Administration: 1996-99
June 1996: Elected prime minister for the first time by a margin of only approximately one percent. He was the first Israeli prime minister to be born after the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948, as well as the first to be directly elected.
September 1996: First met with Palestinian political leader Yasser Arafat.
January 1997: Agreed to a partial withdrawal of Israeli troops from Hebron, in accordance with the 1993 Oslo Accords. However, he was pressured by his coalition to decrease the amount of land given to the Palestinians during subsequent withdrawals.
“Once again, the forces of peace have prevailed over a history of divisions.”
-Former US President Bill Clinton
October 1998: Additional peace talks with Arafat led to the signing of the Wye River Memorandum, an interim agreement outlining an exchange of land for a decrease in Palestinian terrorism. Many members of Netanyahu’s coalition resigned in protests, leading to the government’s dissolution.
May 1999: Ehud Barak’s Labor Party easily defeated Likud, ending Netanyahu’s term as prime minister. He subsequently resigned from the Knesset and Ariel Sharon took over as leader of the Likud.
Netanyahu in the Political Wilderness: 1999-2009
Post-loss 1999-2002: Removed himself from the political sphere, serving as a consultant in the private sector for high-tech companies.
November 2002: With prime minister Sharon’s coalition in turmoil and an election looming, Netanyahu accepted Sharon’s offer to become minister of foreign affairs, thus setting the stage for his return to the Knesset.
February 2003: Became minister of finance, though he remained a member of Sharon’s cabinet.
December 2005: Sharon left the Likud to form the Kadima party. In turn, Netanyahu was elected leader of the Likud.
March 2006: Kadima wins an election, with Netanyahu again becoming leader of the opposition.
February 2009: A close election resulted in Likud obtaining one less seat than Kadima, generating uncertainty regarding whether Netanyahu or Tzipi Livni would be asked to form a governing coalition.
Netanyahu Reassumed Premiership
March 2009: After successfully garnering support from Yisrael Beiteinu and Shas, in addition to several smaller parties, Netanyahu was sworn in for his second term as prime minister.
June 2009: Expressed support for a hypothetical Palestinian state if it remained demilitarized and its leaders agreed to acknowledge Israel as a Jewish state. Palestinian officials quickly rejected the overture.
November 2009: Announced that Israel would impose an unprecedented 10-month freeze on construction in West Bank settlements, describing the move as an attempt to restart stalled peace negotiations.
September 2010: Met with US President Barack Obama, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Jordanian King Abdullah II, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Washington, D.C. to discuss peace between Israel and the Palestinians. Attended a second meeting with Abbas in Egypt to further negotiate peace agreements.
May 2011: Fatah and Hamas signed a reconciliation agreement, leading Netanyahu to urge Abbas to cancel the agreement and elect to work on peace with Israel. At a meeting with US Congress, Netanyahu declared his intentions to make compromises for peace with the Palestinians, though he emphasized that Israel did not intend to return to the boundaries that existed before the Six-Day War in 1967.
October 2012: The Knesset voted to dissolve after disagreeing on the budget for 2013, as well as disputes over whether to allow Haredi Jews to be exempted from serving in the IDF.
January 2013: Netanyahu and Likud remained in power after the election, though the new centrist party Yesh Atid had gained traction, taking the second-most amount of seats in the Knesset.
October 2013: While addressing the UN General Assembly, Netanyahu condemned Iran for attempting to acquire nuclear weapons.
“A wolf in sheep’s clothing, a wolf who thinks he can pull the wool over the eyes of the international community.”
–Netanyahu about Iranian President Hassan Rouhani
July 2014: Netanyahu kickstarted a 50-day military operation in the Gaza Strip after Hamas launched rockets into Israel. He received significant international backlash due to the large number of Palestinian casualties.
December 2014: Disagreements within the coalition regarding budgeting, and a bill that would formally declare Israel as a Jewish state, led Netanyahu to ask Hatnua’s Tzipi Livni and Yesh Atid’s Yair Lapid to resign from his cabinet. The Knesset dissolved, setting an early election in 2015.
March 2015: Attended a meeting with US Congress to address Iran’s nuclear activity and the Obama administration’s Iran policy. This sparked controversy, as House Speaker John Boehner did not inform the White House beforehand. Critics believed US bipartisan support for Israel was jeopardized due to Netanyahu’s open opposition to the Obama administration. However, Netanyahu and the Likud Party still managed to retain their power in the Knesset after the March 17th election.
January 2017: Israeli authorities began to suspect Netanyahu of corruption, though he denied the charges.
February 2018: The police announced that there was sufficient evidence suggesting that Netanyahu was guilty of bribery, fraud, and breach of trust.
July 2018: The controversial Nation-State Bill is passed into law. The law now formally states that Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people. Benjamin Netanyahu described the passage of the new law as “a pivotal moment in the annals of Zionism and the State of Israel. We enshrined in law the basic principle of our existence.”
Netanyahu Faces Indictment and a Struggling Coalition: 2018-2021
November 2018: After intense fighting between Israel and Hamas, Netanyahu struck a truce, causing Avigdor Lieberman to resign from his cabinet position and withdraw his party, Yisrael Beiteinu, from the coalition. Lieberman’s resignation directly caused a political stalemate, leading to the dissolution of the Knesset and the first in a sequence of elections.
February 2019: Netanyahu was officially indicted on charges of bribery, fraud, and breach of trust. His hearings were not set until after the election.
April-May 2019: Netanyahu was elected Prime Minister for the fifth time, though neither he nor his rivals were able to form a coalition, prompting another election.
July 2019: After serving more than 4,875 days in office, Netanyahu became the longest-serving Israeli Prime Minister since the first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion.
September-October 2019: For the second time, Netanyahu failed to form a coalition and obtain a majority of seats in the Knesset. Netanyahu’s pre-indictment hearings began.
December 2019: Gideon Sa’ar challenged Netanyahu for leadership over the Likud party, but the premier retained control.
January 2020: Netanyahu was formally indicted after withdrawing his appeal for parliamentary immunity.
March 2020: In the third election in under a year, Likud, together with other parties who would likely have formed a coalition, gained 59 seats in the Knesset – just short of a majority.
April-May 2020: Again, Netanyahu struggled to form a coalition, though because of COVID, he formed an emergency unity government with Blue and White party leader Benny Gantz, thus retaining his premiership. Gantz became Alternative Prime Minister, meaning he was, at the time, set to take over after 18 months.
May 2020: Trials on Netanyahu’s corruption charges began in Jerusalem’s District Court.
September 2020: Netanyahu signed the US-brokered Abraham Accords with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. This was the first time Israel signed a peace agreement with an Arab country since it established ties with Jordan in 1994.
December 2020: The Knesset failed to pass the 2021 budget, causing the emergency government to dissolve.
March-April 2021: After a new round of elections, Likud fell short of a majority and Netanyahu failed to form a government coalition.
June 2021: Less than 30 minutes before the deadline, Yair Lapid and Yamina Party leader Naftali Bennett announced a joint coalition. In a vote of only 60-59, Bennett was officially elected Prime Minister, ending Netanyahu’s 12 years in power.
Featured Image: Lior Mizrahi/Getty Images
