1. EL «HALCON» AMOROSO: La afición al poder y al sexo de Bibi Netanyahu, el nuevo primer ministro de Israel cuya política radical levanta inquietudes Jun 2, 1996 / By El Mundo
2. ISRAELI 1ST LADY HAS UP-HILL FIGHT Jul 9, 1996 / By NY Daily News
3. Despatches: Israeli press mauls Mrs Netanyahu Dec 12, 1997 / By BBC
4. Jerusalem Journal; New Israeli Politics: Sex, Scandal and Sound Bites Jan 16, 1993 / New York Times
5. Politics and Society in Modern Israel: Myths and Realities by Adam M. Garfinkle (1999)
6. British born Bibi’s second-ex
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EL «HALCON» AMOROSO: La afición al poder y al sexo de Bibi Netanyahu, el nuevo primer ministro de Israel cuya política radical levanta inquietudes
http://www.elmundo.es/papel/hemeroteca/1996/06/02/cronica/115814.html
By RAMY WURGAFT
THE ‘HALCON’ Amore
The love of power and the sex of Bibi Netanyahu, the new prime minister of Israel whose radical politics raises concerns
By Ramy Wurgaft
Jerusalén
Bibi, rey de Israel! El vencedor de las elecciones descorrió furtivamente la cortina. Allí estaban los adeptos del Partido Likud -«mis incondicionales»-, congregados frente al hotel para aclamarle a gritos.
{{Bibi, King of Israel! The winner of the elections descorrió stealthily curtain. There were adherents of the Likud Party – “my unconditional” – gathered in front of the hotel shouting for acclamation.}}
Benjamin «Bibi» Netanyahu reconoció en la muchedumbre a su público de siempre. Los habitantes de los barrios populares, al sur de Tel Aviv. Jornaleros, taxistas, pequeños comerciantes. Pero también observó un número inusitado de ortodoxos: jóvenes seminaristas sudando a mares en sus caftanes oscuros. Eran ellos los que coreaban «¡Bibi, rey de Israel!», agitando furiosamente sus breviarios.
{{Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu acknowledged in the crowd to their audience ever. The inhabitants of the popular neighbourhoods, south of Tel Aviv. Jornaleros, taxi drivers, small traders. But we also observed an unusual number of Orthodox: young seminarians seas sweating in their dark caftanes. It was they who chanted “Bibi, King of Israel!” Furiously waving his breviary.}}
Como si el infractor del mandamiento de «no fornicarás», el degustador de cuanto manjar prohibe la ley judaica, fuese un santo y la lujosa suite que ocupaba en el Hilton, su hornacina. Bibi repasó las páginas de su biografía, maravillándose de que los ortodoxos aupasen en el Poder a alguien con un pasado tan tormentoso como el suyo.
{{As if the offender’s commandment ‘not fornication “, the taster of what Jewish law forbids delicacy, was a saint and occupied the luxurious suite at the Hilton, its niche. Bibi reviewed the pages of his biography, wonders that the Orthodox AUP in Power someone with a past as stormy as his own.}}
El último de sus numerosos «affaires», y también el más sonado, ocurrió en octubre de 1993. En esa ocasión, Bibi había engañado a su esposa con Rut Bar, una atractiva asesora de imagen. Sara recibió un anónimo por medio del cual se enteró no sólo de que había otra mujer, sino también de unos vídeos en los que Bibi aparecía ejercitando sus dotes amatorias. El asunto no hubiera pasado a mayores de no haber coincidido con las elecciones internas del Partido Likud, que Netanyahu estaba decidido a ganar a cualquier precio.
{{The last of his many “affaires”, and also sounded more, occurred in October 1993. On that occasion, Bibi had deceived his wife with Ruth Bar, an attractive image consultant. Sara received an anonymous through which she learned not only that there was another woman, but also a few videos in which Bibi appeared exercising their talents amatoria. The matter had not become greater in the absence coincided with the Likud’s internal elections, which Netanyahu was determined to win at any cost.}}
Vídeos porno
Ojeroso y con una sombra de barba -algo muy impropio en él-, Netanyahu desgranó la historia con lujo de detalles, ante las cámaras de la televisión. El público israelí, acostumbrado a políticos santurrones, a verdaderos paradigmas del marido fiel, se relamía los bigotes. ¡Bibi les había brindado un escándalo igual a los que ocurren en la Casa Blanca! Pero el arrepentido Don Juan no se limitó a hacer pucheros, sino que acusó a David Levi, su rival dentro del Partido Likud, de haber encargado a un hampón la filmación del vídeo pornográfico. «Un hombre muy pomposo, inflado como un balón, intenta destruirme», espetó Netanyahu. La descripción no podía corresponder a otro que no fuera Levi.
{{Dark circles and with a shadow of beard-something very improper in it, picking off Netanyahu’s history with detail, before the television cameras. The Israeli public, accustomed to politicians santurrones, real paradigms of faithful husband was relamía the whiskers. Bibi had given them a scandal like those that occur in the White House! But the repentant Don Juan was not confined to make stew, but accused David Levi, his rival within the Likud party, having appointed a hampón the filming of pornographic video. “A man very pompous, inflated like a balloon, trying to destroy” I spit Netanyahu. The description could not match other than Levi.}}
El odio entre Bibi y David respondía más bien al conflicto étnico que existe dentro del Likud, que a la ambición enfermiza de ambos. Benjamin Netanyahu, de 46 años, es un ashkenasita. Un judío de origen europeo en una sociedad en la que europeísmo es sinónimo de progreso. David Levi, de 55 años, es un ex albañil nacido en Marruecos, en una sociedad que mira despectivamente a los marroquíes, especialmente si desempeñan trabajos manuales. Netanyahu, con su título de administrador de empresas, adquirido en el Instituto Tecnológico de Massachussets (EEUU), consideraba a su rival como a un advenedizo. Y David Levi a su oponente como un monigote confeccionado en los Estados Unidos. Un burdo remedo de Bill Clinton.
{{The hatred between Bibi and David responded rather the ethnic conflict that exists within the Likud, that the ambition of both sick. Benjamin Netanyahu, 46 years, is a ashkenasita. A Jew of European origin in a society where Europeanism is synonymous with progress. David Levi, 55, is a former bricklayer who was born in Morocco, in a society that looks despectivamente to Moroccans, especially if played crafts. Netanyahu, with his title of business manager, acquired in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), considered his rival as a advenedizo. And David Levi to his opponent as a little object made in the United States. A crude remedo of Bill Clinton.}}
Al final, el escándalo de los vídeos cayó en el olvido. Benjamin Netanyahu ganó las elecciones primarias, y a finales de 1993 se convirtió en el líder más joven que ha tenido el Likud. Bibi se arremangó la camisa y se entregó de lleno a la reconstrucción de su partido, en ruinas desde la derrota electoral de 1992.
{{In the end, the scandal of the videos fell into oblivion. Benjamin Netanyahu won the primary election, since late 1993 became the youngest leader who has had the Likud. Bibi is arremangó shirt and surrendered fully to rebuilding his party, in ruins since the electoral defeat of 1992.}}
Había comenzado la fatigosa marcha que concluyó el miércoles pasado, con el triunfo de Netanyahu sobre el laborista Simon Peres. La noche de las elecciones, Bibi tardó muchísimo en comparecer ante sus colaboradores, que esperaban una palabra de aliento, pues la jornada había sido intensa y el primer sondeo concedía el triunfo a Peres. Exasperado por su demora, uno de los activistas aventuró: «Bibi debe de estar ensayando sus gestos frente al espejo».
{{He had started the tiring march that ended last Wednesday, with Netanyahu’s victory over the Labour Shimon Peres. The election night, Bibi took a lot to appear before his colleagues, who were expecting a word of encouragement, because the day had been intense and the first poll gave the victory to Peres. Exasperated by its delay, one of the activists ventured: “Bibi should be rehearsing his gestures in front of the mirror.”}}
El narcisismo, el arte de la simulación ante las cámaras, es un factor esencial en la trayectoria de Netanyahu. La clave para descifrar a un político que muchos israelíes consideran un icono televisivo, tan apto para promocionar Coca Cola como para vender la instauración de la soberanía israelí en Cisjordania. La campaña del Partido Likud, confeccionada a la medida de Bibi, no expuso ideas, sólo imágenes. Como la imagen siniestra de los atentados suicidas.
{{The narcissism, the art of simulation in front of the cameras, is an essential factor in Netanyahu’s career. The key to decrypt a politician who many Israelis considered a television icon, as suitable to promote Coca Cola to sell the establishment of Israeli sovereignty in the West Bank. The campaign of the Likud Party, made a far Bibi, gave no ideas, only images. As the sinister image of suicide bombings.}}
Netanyahu ha pasado la mitad de su vida en los Estados Unidos y de ahí se explica su idilio con la televisión, uno de los pocos amores estables que ha tenido el chico a quien la revista Vanity Fair calificó de «galán de la política judía». Nacido en Tel Aviv, Bibi se trasladó en 1962 a Washington, donde su padre, el hispanista Ben Zión Netanyahu, preparó la obra Los Orígenes de la Inquisición en la España del Siglo XV, por la cual la editorial Random House le pagó como adelanto 25 millones de pesetas, y que se publicó recientemente.
{{Netanyahu has spent half his life in the United States and then explains his idyll with television, one of the few stable love that has taken the boy to whom the magazine Vanity Fair described as “gallant of Jewish politics.” Born in Tel Aviv, Bibi moved in 1962 to Washington, where his father, Ben Zion Netanyahu El Hispano, prepared the book The Origins of the Inquisition in Spain in the fifteenth century, by which the publisher Random House paid him as advancement 25 million pesetas, which was published recently.}}
Infancia dura / Childhood lasts
Ben Zión fue uno de los padres fundadores del Likud. Un aristócrata romántico que inculcó en sus hijos -Yoni, Benjamin e Iddo- la noción de que los Netanyahu están destinados a ser los redentores de Israel. Una versión israelí del clan Kennedy.
{{Ben Zion was one of the founding fathers of the Likud. A romantic aristocrat who instilled in their children-Yoni, Benjamin and Iddo-the notion that Netanyahu are destined to be the redemptive Israel. An Israeli version of the Kennedy clan.}}
«La de Bibi es una continua lucha por estar a la altura de las expectativas de su padre. Mientras los demás chicos correteaban detrás de un balón, el hijo intermedio de Ben Zión y de Sela -una brillante profesora de Derecho- se pasaba horas ensayando el discurso de su cumpleaños. Benjamin es el niño que no tuvo infancia», dice Arie Suskín, psicólogo de la Universidad Hebrea de Jerusalén.
{{“Bibi is one of continuous struggle to live up to the expectations of his father. While the other guys run behind a ball, the middle son of Ben Zion and Sela-a brilliant professor of law-were spent hours rehearsing the speech for his birthday. Benjamin is the child who had no children, “said Arie Suskín, psychologist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.}}
El «norteamericanismo» siempre le ha perseguido. En 1984, Isaac Shamir decidió que el papel de embajador ante la ONU le venía de maravillas a su delfín Netanyahu. Y Bibi no defraudó la confianza del primer ministro y se granjeó la estima de la comunidad judía, que descubrió en él a un híbrido entre el macho israelí y el dandy americano.
{{The ‘American’ it has always pursued. In 1984, Isaac Shamir decided that the role of ambassador to the UN him came from his wonders dolphin Netanyahu. And Bibi did not disappoint the confidence of the prime minister and earned the esteem of the Jewish community, who discovered him in a hybrid between the male Israeli and American dandy.}}
Gracias a su encanto, el embajador consiguió que los magnates de Nueva York, fustigados por sus esposas, duplicaran las donaciones a Israel. La única desventaja de «Bibi boy», a los ojos de las princesas hebreas, consistía en su matrimonio con una israelí llamada Miki de la que se divorció en 1979, para casarse con la norteamericana Fleur (Flor) Cates. La flor no tardó en marchitarse junto a aquel barba azul. En 1990, éste la dio de baja para desposar a Sara, su actual esposa y la madre de su hijo pequeño.
{{Thanks to its charm, the ambassador got the magnates of New York, chastising them by their wives, doubling donations to Israel. The only drawback of “Bibi boy ‘in the eyes of the Jewish princesses, consisted of her marriage with an Israeli named Miki from which he divorced in 1979, to marry the American Fleur (Flower) Cates. The flowers soon wilt next to that blue beard. In 1990, he gave the floor for dismissal of Sarah, his current wife and mother of his young child.}}
En el cuadrilátero de la ONU, Netanyahu elevó a la quinta potencia sus dotes de hombre de mundo y perfeccionó el inglés hasta el límite de la pedantería. Pero la experiencia esencial derivó de su contacto con los leones de la televisión norteamericana: gente de la estatura de Ted Koppel, Larry King o Dan Rather, quienes descubrieron en él a un ave de raro plumaje: un israelí que pronunciaba el inglés sin la erre gutural de sus congéneres y, lo que es más, un israelí que se preocupaba de ofrecer a las cámaras el lado bueno de su rostro y se dejaba maquillar con una paciencia paquidérmica.
{{The quadrilateral of the UN, Netanyahu rose to the fifth power talents of man of the world and perfected the English to a limit of the pedantería. But the essential experience stemmed from his contact with the lions of American television: people of the stature of Ted Koppel, Larry King or Dan Rather, who discovered him in a rare bird plumage: an Israeli who spoke in English without erre guttural their fellow human beings and, what is more, an Israeli who was concerned to provide the cameras bright side of his face and was left with a disguise paquidérmica patience.}}
Bibi era distinto de Golda Meir, la mítica primera ministra que fumaba cigarros de carretero en el estudio, o de Moshe Dayán, que solía escarbarse la nariz con absoluto desparpajo. Ted y Larry habían encontrado al buen salvaje y Bibi había descubierto América.
{{Bibi was different from Golda Meir, the legendary prime minister who smoked cigars road in the study, or Moshe Dayan, who used to scratch your nose with absolute desparpajo. Ted and Larry had found the noble savage and Bibi had discovered americas.}}
En los cócteles, galas y recepciones que frecuentaban, Netanyahu les contaba los chismes de la aristocracia judeo-norteamericana y ellos le iniciaban en las artes de vender su doctrina sobre la seguridad de Israel, como si fuera la receta para cocinar pastel americano. El secreto era vender un producto digerible que no excitara la materia gris del telespectador, sino más bien las glándulas lacrimales o el sistema nervioso vegetativo.
{{At the cocktail parties, galas and receptions to attend, Netanyahu told them the gossip of the Jewish-American aristocracy and they started in the arts to sell its doctrine on Israel’s security, as if the American pie recipe for cooking. The secret was to sell a product digestible not arouse the viewer’s gray matter, but rather the lacrimal gland or vegetative nervous system.}}
Netanyahu fue un alumno aventajado. Siguiendo los consejos de estos «profesores Higgins», el bisoño político dibujó un croquis donde aparecía el mapa de Israel, rodeado de cañones árabes. Luego trazó una línea entre la localidad cisjordana de Kalkilia y la ciudad judía de Natania, a orillas del Mediterráneo, para indicar que si Israel cede los territorios ocupados, su «cintura» quedará reducida a 17 kilómetros. Ergo, cualquier pastor de ovejas armado de un tirachinas puede cortar el Estado judío en dos, y de ahí al apocalipsis, la distancia es como habíamos dicho, de 17 kilómetros.
{{Netanyahu was a pupil ahead. Following advice from these “teachers Higgins’, the political bisoño drew a sketch showing a map of Israel, cannons surrounded by Arabs. Then drew a line between the town of Qalquiliya cisjordana and the Jewish city of Netanya, on the shores of the Mediterranean, to indicate that if Israel cedes the occupied territories, its “waist” is reduced to 17 kilometres. Ergo, any pastor of a sheep armed catapults can cut the Jewish state into two, and hence the apocalypse, the distance is like we said, of 17 kilometers.}}
En Nueva York, las entrevistas de Netanyahu disparaban el «rating» de Larry King Live, pero en Tel Aviv el manual de cómo vender la geopolítica de Oriente Medio en cinco minutos no funcionaba. Los periodistas fueron los primeros en advertir que la «doctrina Netanyahu» era como las fachadas que se erigen en las películas del Oeste: un delgado tabique de ilusión tras el cual no hay más que un páramo.
{{In New York, interviews Netanyahu fired the ‘rating’ Larry King Live, but in Tel Aviv manual how to sell the geopolitics of the Middle East had not worked in five minutes. Journalists were the first to warn that the “doctrine Netanyahu” was like facades to be erected in Western films: a thin wall of illusion after which no more than a wasteland.}}
«Bibi me pareció insustancial: la parodia de un político norteamericano», dice Shimón Shifer, analista del diario Yediot Hajaronot. Reducida a lo básico, la filosofía de Netanyahu predica que los árabes no son de fiar. Cualquier acuerdo debe tomar en cuenta que antes de secarse la tinta, el voluble dictador puede cambiar de parecer. Dado lo cual es imprescindible que Israel conserve Cisjordania y el Golán, de lo contrario el árabe no resistirá la tentación de utilizarlos como plataforma de ataque.
{{“Bibi struck me as insubstantial: parody of an American political,” says Shimon Shifa, an analyst with the daily Yediot Hajaronot. Reduced to basics, philosophy Netanyahu preached that Arabs are not trustworthy. Any agreement must take into account that before the ink dried, the voluble dictator may change its mind. Since this is imperative that Israel retains the West Bank and the Golan, otherwise the Arabic not resist the temptation to use them as a platform for attack.}}
La opinión pública permanecía sorda al canto de la sirena, pues aparte de su simplismo, la oferta de Bibi no podía competir con el show de la paz. El jefe del Likud no tenía imágenes para eclipsar a Rabin desfilando sobre la alfombra roja con el rey Husein. Sobre todo, no había una tragedia que compitiera con la realidad virtual del asesinato de Rabin, el 4 de noviembre de 1995.
{{Public opinion remained deaf to the siren song of, because apart from its simplicity, offering Bibi could not compete with the show of peace. The head of the Likud had no images to overshadow to Rabin parading on the red carpet with King Hussein. Above all, there was a tragedy that compete with the virtual reality of the assassination of Rabin, on November 4, 1995.}}
Bibi parecía condenado al limbo de la política, hasta que al año siguiente, los islamistas lanzaron una ofensiva contra el transporte público. Aquel infierno de cuerpos desmembrados, de cartílagos flotando en la copa de los árboles desquició a los israelíes. Hasta tal punto que comenzaron a prestar atención a los predicamentos de aquel guapo de modales afectados. Al autor del libro Terrorismo: cómo debe ser combatido por Occidente, que sólo consiguió la crítica favorable de un Ronald Reagan al borde del Alzheimer.
{{Bibi seemed doomed to the political limbo until the following year, the Islamists launched an offensive against public transport. One hell of dismembered bodies, of cartilage floating in the crown of trees desquició the Israelis. So much so that began to pay attention to the predicaments that handsome of manners affected. When author of Terrorism: how it should be fought by the West, who only got a favorable critique Ronald Reagan on the brink of Alzheimer’s.}}
Líder enigmático / Leader enigmatic
El 30 de mayo de 1996, el elixir del triunfo, acompañado de unas copitas de su whisky predilecto, borraban del paladar la amargura de tantas batallas perdidas. El vencedor de las elecciones descorrió furtivamente las cortinas, y observó que un grupo de soldados se había sumado a quienes le aclamaban «¡Bibi, rey de Israel!». Con una sonrisa de orgullo, Netanyahu evocó su paso por Sayeret Matkal, la mejor unidad de elite del Ejército: un auténtico crisol de héroes y de leyendas.
{{On May 30, 1996, the elixir of victory, coupled with some scoops his favorite whiskey, erased the bitterness of the palate of many battles lost. The winner of the elections descorrió stealthily curtains, and noted that a group of soldiers who had joined him acclaimed “Bibi, King of Israel!”. With a smile of pride, Netanyahu recalled his tenure in Sayeret Matkal, the best unit of elite Army: a true melting pot of heroes and legends.}}
Como el mito de su hermano Yoni, quien murió acribillado por las balas de un francotirador en el aeropuerto de Uganda. Yoni fue el comandante de la Operación Entebbe, que en 1976 consiguió rescatar a 106 rehenes de las garras del dictador Idi Amín.
{{As the myth of his brother Yoni, who died riddled by bullets of a sniper at the airport in Uganda. Yoni was the operation commander Entebbe, who in 1976 managed to rescue 106 hostages from the clutches of the dictator Idi Amin.}}
Bibi Netanyahu no rebasó el heroísmo de su hermano, pero tuvo un papel destacado en el ataque contra el aeropuerto de Beirut en 1968 y en el rescate de los pasajeros de un vuelo de Sabena en 1972, operación en la que resultó herido. Su fulgurante carrera militar jamás pudo compensar el duelo por la muerte de su Yoni, la única persona ante la cual Bibi se quitaba la máscara de las relaciones públicas. Desde que Yoni murió, nadie puede preciarse de conocer al nuevo primer ministro de Israel.
{{Bibi Netanyahu did not exceed the heroism of his brother, but took a leading role in the attack on Beirut airport in 1968 and the rescue of passengers of a Sabena flight in 1972 operation in which wounded. His brilliant military career could never compensate mourn the death of her Yoni, the only person to whom Bibi removes the mask of public relations. Since Yoni died, no one can boast of knowing the new prime minister of Israel.}}
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Un dandy seductor / A Dandy seducer
El nuevo primer ministro israelí es un hombre de tortuoso pasado. En 1993 protagonizó uno de los últimos escándalos al conocerse su romance con Rut Bar (izquierda), su asesora de imagen. La esposa de Netanyahu, Sara (los dos, arriba), tuvo que aguantar además la difusión de unos vídeos pornográficos con su marido como estrella. Pero su mezcla de macho y dandy y su énfasis en la seguridad han seducido al electorado, preocupado por el terrorismo integrista y el futuro de el país.
{{The new Israeli prime minister is a man of tortuous past. In 1993, starred one of the recent scandals to know his romance with Ruth Bar (left), his image adviser. Netanyahu’s wife, Sara (both above), had to endure further dissemination of some pornographic videos with her husband as a star. But its mix of male and dandy and its emphasis on security have seduced the electorate, concerned about fundamentalist terrorism and the future of the country.}}
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ISRAELI 1ST LADY HAS UP-HILL FIGHT
http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/1996/07/09/1996-07-09_israeli_1st_lady_has_up-hill.html
Tuesday, July 9th 1996, 2:00AM / By HELEN KENNEDY With Andrew Meisels in Jerusalem
She’s the college-educated wife of one of the world’s most powerful leaders. She’s a baby boomer with a temper, is quick to fire staffers and her blond hair makes headlines.
And she stands by her man even when unpleasant photos of another woman show up on page 1.
Hillary Clinton? Nope. It’s Sarah Netanyahu, who makes her U.S. debut as Israel’s new first lady when she arrives in Washington today with her husband, Benjamin, and their two children.
Since her husband took office three weeks ago, the airwaves, TV chat shows and political cartoons have been filled with scandalous gossip about their home life.
It’s a new phenomenon for Israel, which is accustomed to aging leaders with retiring, all-but-invisible wives.
In quick succession, Sarah Netanyahu’s been hit by a series of controversies:
Portrayed as vain and bitter, she was attacked for allegedly requesting her own office in the Prime Ministry.
Her husband’s spokesmen were forced to officially confirm she was pregnant when she became Netanyahu’s third wife in 1991.
Two fired nannies publicly blasted her for being an imperious neat freak. Tanya Shaw said she was canned last week for burning a pot of vegetable soup and described Sarah as a nightmarish employer who made her buy her own food. A second au pair, Heidi Ben-Yair, said she quit in 1994 because Sarah rationed eggs and tomatoes and made her work 19 hours straight without a break even for a shower.
On Sunday, a new scandal broke when Netanyahu’s 20-year friendship with a married American woman was revealed. Katherine Price-Mondadori was quoted as saying that Netanyahu, whom she met at a New York cocktail party, was a sensuous man who “adores women, food and everything that’s bello.”
Yediot Ahronot, Israel’s top-selling daily, ran an old photograph of Netanyahu and Price-Mondadori smiling together at a table clanking with wine and beer bottles.
As she left Israel yesterday, Sarah who wears her blond, shoulder-length hair in a bob was blasted for demanding that a hairdresser be at her beck and call after she arrives in New York on Thursday. She also has demanded a collection of playthings from Toys “R” Us be delivered to Blair House in Washington for her sons.
Sarah told Israel’s Channel 2 that she and her husband just wanted to be “regular people” and begged for “a bit of reprieve from the endless delving into our lives.”
Critics said the Netanyahus invited the scrutiny by adopting American-style personality politics. “Whoever places his family on center stage to receive applause must understand that this includes peering behind the scenes as well,” wrote the daily Maariv.
GRAPHIC: COMPARING FIRST LADIES – HILLARY CLINTON
CURRENT POSITION: America’s First Lady
AGE: 48
EDUCATION: Law degree
PROFESSION: Former lawyer
VOCATION: Child advocate
HUSBAND: Prematurely gray Democrat who admitted on TV that he and his wife had marital problems after his alleged mistress claimed he cheated.
HUSBAND’S NICKNAME: Bubba
PREVIOUSLY MARRIED: No
CHILDREN: Daughter, Chelsea, 16
SCANDAL: Travelgate, Filegate, Whitewater
PERSONALITY QUIRKS: Allegedly throws lamps
QUOTE: Begged press for “space and of reprieve from the endless delving into ourlives.”
GRAPHIC: COMPARING FIRST LADIES – SARAH NETANYAHU
CURRENT POSITION: Israel’s First Lady
AGE: 37
EDUCATION: Two degrees in psychology
PROFESSION: Former stewardess
VOCATION: Child psychologist
HUSBAND: Prematurely gray conservative who admitted on TV that he cheated on her.
HUSBAND’S NICKNAME: Bibi
PREVIOUSLY MARRIED: Yes
CHILDREN: Two sons, Yair, 4, and Avner, 18 months.
SCANDAL: Cattlegate, Nannygate
PERSONALITY QUIRKS: Allegedly throws luggage
QUOTE: Begged press for “a bit some normal family life.”
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Despatches: Israeli press mauls Mrs Netanyahu
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/despatches/39056.stm
Friday, December 12, 1997 Published at 16:50 GMT
Sara Netanyahu is the premier’s third wife
The Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has responded angrily to a fresh round of media reports about his wife, Sarah. A lengthy article in one of today’s Israeli papers alleges that Sarah Netanyahu enjoys perks not normally allowed to the first lady and describes frequent angry outbursts against staff members and even her own husband. It’s not the first time Sarah Netanyahu has been criticised in this way. The Prime Minister says the latest allegations have broken all boundaries. Our Middle East correspondent Paul Adams reports from Jerusalem.
Sarah Netanyahu has never been a favourite of the media. The Prime Minister’s third wife, a former air-hostess, has been under attack ever since her husband’s election victory, 18 months ago.
Her emotional outbursts, usually against members of her personal staff are legendary. According to a detailed expose in today’s popular newspaper Yediot Aharanot, an employer at the Prime Minister’s house with 30 years’ service, found herself under a barrage of shoes, when Sarah Netanyahu didn’t like the way they had been cleaned.
The Prime Minister himself was on the receiving end of another tantrum when pop singer Ofra Haza had the termerity to touch him during the taping of a television chat show. These are the juicy details Israelis love to read about and the largely left of centre press love to report.
But other allegations raise more serious issues, according to the article, Sarah Netanyahu has personal secretaries and a chauffeur, paid out of public funds and even runs an office in the Prime Minister’s own bureau.
Suggestions that such perks are not in the public interest, and may even be illegal, have left some politicans to demand a parliamentary debate.
The Prime Minister has reacted furiously. He says he and his wife have been exposed to unprecedented defamation, which had reached new levels of malice and wickedness. But this latest over the Netanyahu’s may have a silver lining.
A cartoon in another paper said the allegations are unique in Israeli journalism, unique because they make the Prime Minister himself look good.
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Jerusalem Journal; New Israeli Politics: Sex, Scandal and Sound Bites
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE7D7153AF935A25752C0A965958260
January 16, 1993 / By CLYDE HABERMAN,
The phrase by now may have become a cliche, but Israelis found themselves nonetheless transfixed today by sex, lies and videotape.
For a country that has been under a cloud of international condemnation for weeks because of its deportation of 415 Palestinians to Lebanon, a sex scandal swirling around Benjamin Netanyahu, a former Deputy Prime Minister and the front-runner to become the next leader of the opposition Likud Party, was almost a welcome diversion.
Mr. Netanyahu, 43 years old and two years into his third marriage, appeared grim-faced on the state television on Thursday night as he confessed that he had had an extramarital affair and said that “someone very high up” in Likud who “surrounds himself with criminals” was trying to blackmail him. Keeping Up With the Clintons
In his account, someone representing this senior party member phoned his wife, Sara, and threatened that if Mr. Netanyahu did not drop out of the leadership race, a videotape would be made public supposedly showing him in “compromising romantic situations” with another woman. So in what appears to have been a political version of a pre-emptive strike, Mr. Netanyahu, known universally here by the nickname Bibi, went on the air to disclose the affair himself.
On the front pages of the popular press today, the scandal swept aside presumably more pressing matters like the continuing deportation crisis, the allied bombing of Iraq and new violence and death in the occupied territories.
“Bibigate,” blared Yediot Ahronot, the country’s largest-selling daily. With a wink and a knowing nod, the newspaper published a picture of Bibi and Sara right above another one showing Bill and Hillary (as in Clinton). “Look Where It Got Them,” an accompanying headline said.
The Clinton allusion underscored the persistent Americanization of Israeli politics, a process that Mr. Netanyahu emblemizes and that many people here, even some of his admirers, feel they can live without.
Probably no Israeli politician of his generation is better known to Americans than Bibi Netanyahu, who spent part of his youth in the United States, attended the Massachussetts Institute of Technology and Harvard, and went on to become No. 2 diplomat in the Israeli Embassy in Washington and then his country’s delegate to the United Nations.
A master of idiomatic American English, he knows his way around a sound bite better than just about anybody in this country. Many would also say he is not unhandsome, no matter how politically incorrect the observation may be in some quarters. During the Persian Gulf war, he was both the voice and the face of Israel so many times on the Cable News Network that a casual viewer could have been forgiven the impression that he’d been hired as a correspondent.
In short, whether or not they agree with Mr. Netanyahu’s territorial hawkishness and free-market opinions, most Israelis regard him as tailor-made for a new age of politics here.
Decades of collectivist decision-making by party central committees have rapidly given way to direct appeals to the general voter. The long-suffering Labor Party held Israel’s first-ever primary a year ago, and went on to win the national election and install Yitzhak Rabin as Prime Minister.
Nothing succeeds like success, and Likud has to decided to hold its own primary in March. And the next time Israelis go to polls in a general election, now scheduled for 1996, they will directly elect the Prime Minister for the first time.
With the selection of leaders thus shifting from backroom to ballot box, television looms large. Enter Mr. Netanyahu, who, if opinion polls are correct, is overwhelmingly the choice of the Likud rank-and-file to return the party to power.
It was not lost on political commentators here that the man who best represents American-style politics happened be snared in an American-style scandal.
Israelis are long familiar with famous politicians knowing their way around bedrooms as well as battlegrounds, but nobody ever made much of it in public. Suddenly, there was Mr. Netanyahu on national television, going on about an affair that he said had “ended a few months ago.”
It left many Israelis perplexed, and today they debated why, if a crime was alleged, did he go to the television studio instead of a police station, and would he indeed triumph like Mr. Clinton, or fall by wayside like Gary Hart. More than a few also wondered if they would ever see the videotape. Who Is the Likud Godfather?
And, of course, there was the question of who was this Likud higher-up whom Mr. Netanyahu accused of “Mafia-like methods.”
Mr. Netanyahu named no names. But the newspapers focused like a laser beam on David Levy, the former Foreign Minister who is also in the party leadership race, and Benjamin Begin, son of the late Prime Minister Menachem Begin.
To describe the Levy-Netanyahu relationship as poisonous is to qualify for the understatement of the week. But Mr. Levy, while no stranger to political rough-and-tumble, insisted today that he had nothing to do with the affair. Blackmail is wrong, he said, but so is an “attempt to blame it on someone in the party.”
Anonymously, people said to be close to Mr. Levy accused Mr. Netanyahu in the press of having made up the entire tale for publicity purposes. One such quotation appeared today in The Jerusalem Post, most days a strongly pro-Netanyahu newspaper.
“He can’t play the sax like Clinton,” this Levy associate said, “so he invented a Gennifer Flowers.”
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Politics and Society in Modern Israel: Myths and Realities by Adam M. Garfinkle (1999): Page 193 (…) There are other reasons why elite interest in politics lacks the stigma in Israel… First… Second… Third… Fourth, Israelis, especially secular Israelis, are nowhere near as puritanical as Americans, and do not project puritanical attitudes toward politicians… Israelis, like Frenchmen, simply cannot understand Americans on this score. Esraelis expect their politicians to be rapscallions and many would be disappointed if they weren’t, for they would ask: How can they deal with other rapscallions and not get fleeced unless they’re rapscallions themselves?… Even more interesting, in 1992 Benyamin Netanyahu tried to embarrass his Likud rival David Levy by claiming that Levy’s men had spied on him while trying to get evidence of his marital infidelity. In fact, though everyone knows Netanyahu has been unfaithful to his wife Sarah, this incident turned out to have been unproved, and was thought to have been instead an effort by Netanyahu to hurt Levy. Understand what this says about Israeli politics: it’s worse to reveal someone’s adultery on account of a political motive than it is to commit adultery. Frenchmen understand this readily; most Americans have a tougher time.
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Disclaimer: I had the opportunity to know Binyamin Netanyahu’s second wife – the forgotten wife, Fleur, while he was Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations 1984-88. A bright and polite person, it was only through friends that I became aware that Netanyahu transferred his assets back to Israel to place them beyond the scope of divorce proceedings. That and other details left me with the opinion of a self-absorbed opportunist which subsequent events have yet to dispel.
British born Bibi’s second-ex: British-born Fleur, who was married to Benjamin Netanyahu while he was Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, is a director… She is supporter of various cultural initiatives and charities.
