‘Architect of wars’: Netanyahu gears for what could be his political life’s defining contest – World
Polls remain challenging, with a majority of Israelis wanting Netanyahu out over the October 7 security failures.
He has led multiple wars, outlasted several American presidents, and watched his political obituary written ā only to be shredded ā more times than any other leader in modern Israeli history.
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israelās longest-serving prime minister, faces an international arrest warrant over alleged war crimes in Gaza, a long-running corruption trial, and a spiralling multi-front conflict that has dragged on for nearly three years and has seen his countryās first direct military confrontations with arch-foe Iran.
Now the silver-haired 76-year-old, nicknamed āBibiā, is staring down an election that many believe could finally draw the curtain on one of the most consequential and contested careers in Israeli politics ā or extend it once again.
Netanyahu has declared that he āintends to winā in the election scheduled for October 27, setting the stage for what could be the defining contest of his political life.
Shattered image of āMr Securityā
Netanyahu built his entire career on a single promise: that he alone could keep Israel safe.
Then came October 7, 2023.
It was the deadliest day in Israelās history, with Hamasās attacks leaving more than 1,200 people dead and shattering the image of āMr Securityā that Netanyahu had spent decades cultivating.
The wars that followed have become both a political lifeline and his legacyās greatest threat.
Netanyahu has overseen relentless bombardment of Gaza for two years that left tens of thousands dead. Israelās actions under his watch were declared a genocide by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and experts, which Tel Aviv rejects.
The conflict quickly spread beyond the Palestinian territory, drawing in Lebanonās Hezbollah, Yemenās Houthi rebels, and eventually Iran, fundamentally reshaping the Middle Eastās strategic landscape.
Militarily, Israel demonstrated overwhelming reach, striking deep inside Iran, yet the diplomatic endgame has largely unfolded outside Netanyahuās control.
Whether these wars ultimately redeem or irreparably taint his leadership remains the central question in the elections.
Born in Tel Aviv on October 21, 1949, Netanyahu is the son of a right-wing Zionist historian ā an ideological inheritance that shaped his entire career.
He served in Israelās commando unit and fought in the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.
Netanyahu has two sons with his third wife, Sara and a daughter from a previous marriage. In his early life, his elder brother Yonatan was killed leading the Entebbe hostage-rescue mission in Uganda.
āWhen the news reached me that Yoni had died, I felt as if my life had ended,ā Netanyahu later wrote.
Reshaping Middle East
Raised partly in the US and educated at MIT, he became one of Israelās most effective international advocates ā a polished, English-speaking envoy equally comfortable in Washington television studios and UN halls.
He entered parliament in 1988, took control of the Likud party in 1993 and, three years later, became Israelās youngest prime minister at 46.
In all, he has spent nearly two decades in the role across multiple terms.
For years, Netanyahu argued that Israelās security rested on military strength, intelligence superiority and deterrence.
The Hamas assault exposed catastrophic failures in all three under his watch.
As the war widened, Netanyahu cast the conflict in increasingly historic terms: not merely as a battle against Hamas, but as a once-in-a-generation struggle to reshape the region and break Iranās regional influence.
āWe are going to change the Middle East,ā he vowed after the Hamas attacks.
Supporters say he responded to Israelās darkest hour with unprecedented military determination, challenging Tehran more directly than any predecessor.
Critics tell a different story: a leader who used the war to delay a reckoning over the failures behind October 7, and who, they argue, fell short of his own war goals ā namely eliminating Hamas and toppling the Iranian leadership.
The conflict has also unfolded against a backdrop of a collapsed Israeli-Palestinian peace process and the continued expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, developments that critics say have pushed the prospect of a Palestinian state further out of reach than ever.
The Trump alliance
Netanyahu has survived and often frustrated successive American administrations, but few foreign relationships have mattered more to him than his ties with US President Donald Trump.
Since Trumpās return to the White House, the two have maintained a close relationship, with Netanyahu hailing him as āthe greatest friendā Israel ever had in the White House.
But even that alliance has shown signs of strain, with Trump unleashing profanity-laced tirades on his ally amid the fraught negotiations over the Iran deal, which Israel watched from the sidelines.
At home, the criticism has grown sharper.
āBenjamin Netanyahu is a man blessed with talents, but he has grown old and tired, and is surrounded by the least suitable people to run a country,ā opposition leader Yair Lapid said recently, insisting that accountability for October 7 and Netanyahuās continued leadership are irreconcilable.
Tough polls
Polls remain challenging, with a majority of Israelis wanting Netanyahu out amid lingering public anger over the October 7 security failures, and he is still fighting corruption charges in court.
For decades, Netanyahu has defied every prediction of his downfall ā most dramatically in 2022, when he returned to power backed by far-right allies.
Now, the battle over his legacy may prove the hardest fight of all.
The wars waged under his watch will determine how history remembers him.
In a recent interview, Netanyahu expressed his comfort with making unpopular decisions that he felt were right, saying he felt little need to be lionised in the press.
āI would rather get a bad editorial than a positive obituary,ā he said.
