Gideon Saar, Netanyahu’s former rival named foreign minister

Gideon Saar, appointed Israel’s Foreign Minister to replace Israel Katz who inherited Defense after the dismissal of Yoav Gallant, is a former rival of Benjamin Netanyahu within Likud, from which he slammed the door in 2020 .

Propelled into politics by Mr. Netanyahu twenty-five years ago, Mr. Saar tried unsuccessfully to take his position as leader of the Likud from him, before leaving the large right-wing formation to found his own in 2020. party, Tikva Hadasha (New Hope).

A former journalist and lawyer, Mr. Saar, 57, is more on the right than Mr. Netanyahu. He notably advocated an annexation of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967. The two men formalized their reconciliation with the return in September of Mr. Saar to the government in a position of minister without portfolio. A rapprochement which allowed Mr. Netanyahu to expand his majority in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament.

The appointment of Mr. Saar to a full ministerial post “will strengthen the coalition and stabilize the government, which is crucial especially in times of war”, underlined the Prime Minister in a press release published on Tuesday. “Gideon Saar brings substantial experience and sound judgment in security and policy matters, which makes him a valuable addition to our leadership team,” Mr. Netanyahu also noted.

Several times minister

After the start of the war between Israel and Hamas, triggered by the attack of the Palestinian movement on October 7, 2023 on Israeli soil, Mr. Saar responded positively to Mr. Netanyahu’s request to enter into a government of national union, to a first post of minister without portfolio. However, he resigned in March in the face of Mr. Netanyahu’s refusal to place him in the war cabinet, a body ultimately dissolved in June. Mr. Saar judges that Likud has “abandoned its values ​​under Netanyahu,” recalls MP Sharren Haskel, who left this formation to join that of the dissident.

Son of a father who grew up in Argentina and a mother from Bukhara, Uzbekistan, Gideon Saar calls himself a practicing Jew while affirming that “every Israeli citizen must be able to live freely according to his conscience and his way of life”. This father of four children, two of whom are with star journalist Geoula Even, does not have the charisma of his former mentor but enjoys, in Israel, an image of honesty and probity.

Mr. Saar entered politics in 1999 at the age of 32 as Mr. Netanyahu’s right-hand man in government, before being elected to the Knesset in 2003, rising through the ranks and becoming minister of Interior then Education, always in the governments of Mr. Netanyahu. After leaving Likud, in 2021 he joined the government of Naftali Bennett (New Right) as Minister of Justice.