On this day: Benjamin Netanyahu’s birthday - The Jewish Chronicle

The ninth prime minister of Israel, now serving a second term in office.

Born in Tel Aviv, after a childhood in Jerusalem and time in the United States as a teenager, Benjmain Netanyahu returned to Israel in 1967 and joined the army. He went on to serve as a member of the elite Matkal unit, helping in operations including the Sabena Airlines hostage rescue – a mission in which he was wounded. As a reservist he fought in the Yom Kippur and was made a captain.

After his time in the army the man who is now known widely as “Bibi” studied at MIT and Harvard, then worked as a management consultant. Following the death of his brother Yoni in the Entebbe mission, he was involved in the international debate over how to combat terrorist organisations throughout the 1970s and 1980s. In 1982 he was made the deputy chief of mission at the Israeli Embassy in Washington.

In 1984 he was named as Israel's ambassador to the UN, and four years later he stood successfully to become a Likud MK. He rose through the ranks of the party and when Likud won power in the 1996 election, following the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, he became Israeli prime minister – defeating the now president Shimon Peres.