JERUSALEM: Naftali Bennett, who had been sworn in Sunday as Israel’s new prime minister, embodies lots of the contradictions which establish the 73-year-old country.
He is a spiritual Jew who left millions in the largely secular hi-tech business; a winner of the settlement movement that resides in a Tel Aviv suburb; a former president of Benjamin Netanyahu who’s partnered with centrist and left handed parties to finish his 12-year rule.
His ultranationalist Yamina celebration won only seven chairs in the 120-member Knesset at March elections — the fourth largest such election in a couple of decades.
However, by refusing to devote to Netanyahu or his competitions, Bennett placed himself as kingmaker.
Even after one among the religious civic party left him to protest the new coalition bargain, he finished up with all the crown.
AN ULTRANATIONALIST WITH A MODERATE COALITION Bennett has positioned himself to the best of Netanyahu.
However he’ll be seriously restricted with his own unwieldy coalition, that includes just a narrow majority in parliament and contains celebrations from the right, centre and left.
He’s in relation to Palestinian autonomy and supports Jewish settlements from the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, which the Palestinians and all the worldwide community view as a significant barrier to peace.
Bennett fiercely criticised Netanyahu following the prime minister consented to impede settlement arrangement under strain in President Barack Obama, that attempted and failed to renew the peace process early in his first semester.
He briefly served as part of the West Bank settler’s council, Yesha, prior to entering the Knesset at 2013.
Bennett afterwards served as cabinet ministry of diaspora affairs, defense and education in several Netanyahu-led authorities.
“He is a right-wing pioneer, a safety hard-liner, but in exactly the identical time quite pragmatic,” explained Yohanan Plesner, head of the Israel Democracy Institute, who’s understood Bennett for years and served him at the army.
He anticipates Bennett to participate with different factions to get a”common denominator” because he cries legitimacy and support as a national pioneer.
RIVALRY WITH NETANYAHU The 49-year-old dad of four stocks Netanyahu’s hawkish approach to the Middle East conflict, but both have had tense relations through recent years.
Bennett served as Netanyahu’s chief of staff for a couple of decades, but they parted ways following a mysterious falling out that Israeli press connected to Netanyahu’s wife, Sara, that exerts great influence on her husband’s inner ring.
Bennett appeared as a right-wing stalwart before the March elections signed a toast on national TV saying he’d never let Yair Lapid, a centrist and Netanyahu’s primary rivalto become prime minister.
Nevertheless, when it became apparent Netanyahu wasn’t able to make a ruling coalition, that is precisely what Bennett did, consenting to function as prime minister for decades prior to handing ability to Lapidthe architect of this new coalition.
Netanyahu’s fans have branded Bennett that a traitor, stating he cried voters.
Bennett has defended his choice as a pragmatic movement aimed at consolidating the nation and averting a fifth round of elections.
A GENERATIONAL SHIFT Bennett, also a father of four and also a contemporary Orthodox Jew, would be Israel’s first prime minister who frequently wears a kippathat the skullcap worn by observant Jews.
He resides in the upscale Tel Aviv suburb of Raanana,” as opposed to the settlements that he champions.
Bennett started life together with his American-born parents at Haifa, subsequently pumped together along with his loved ones between North America and Israel, military service, law faculty and the private industry.
Throughout, he is curated a character that is simultaneously contemporary, religious and civic.
After working in the elite Sayeret Matkal commando unit, Bennett moved into law faculty at Hebrew University.
In 1999he co-founded Cyota, an anti-fraud software firm that was offered in 2005 to US-based RSA Security for about $145 million.
Bennett has stated the sour experience of Israel’s 2006 warfare from the militant group Hezbollah drove him .
The rapid-fire war ended inconclusively, also Israel’s political and military leadership at the time was widely hailed as bungling the effort.
Bennett signifies a third generation of Israeli leaders, even following the founders of this country and Netanyahu’s creation, which came of age throughout the nation’s stressed ancient years marked by continued wars with Arab nations.
“He is Israel 3.0,” Anshel Pfeffer, a columnist for Israel’s left-leaning Haaretz newspaper, wrote in a recent profile of Bennett.
“A Jewish civic although not very dogmatic.
Somewhat spiritual, but definitely not devout.
A military guy who favors the comforts of urban lifestyle and a high tech entrepreneur that is not seeking to create any more countless.
Even a supporter of the Greater Land of Israel although perhaps not a settler.
And he might not be a politician ”