Yair Netanyahu

Yair Netanyahu (Hebrew: יאיר נתניהו‎; born 26 July 1991[1][2]) is the son of Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, known for defending his father on social media.[3]

Yair Netanyahu
Born	(1991-07-26) 26 July 1991 Jerusalem, Israel
Citizenship	Israel
Education	Hebrew University of Jerusalem (BA in international relations
Occupation	None
Known for	Son of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Political party	Likud
Parents	Benjamin Netanyahu (father) Sara Ben-Artzi (mother)
Relatives	Nathan Mileikowsky (great-grandfather) Benzion Netanyahu (grandfather) Elisha Netanyahu (grand-uncle) Yonatan Netanyahu (uncle) Iddo Netanyahu (uncle) Nathan Netanyahu (uncle)

Netanyahu was born in 1991 to Benjamin and Sara Netanyahu. He served in the IDF Spokesperson's Unit.[4][5] In January 2018, a scandal erupted when a recording of Netanyahu's visit to a Tel Aviv strip club was leaked. In the tape, Netanyahu discussed strippers and referred to a controversial gas deal signed by his father.[6] He filed a lawsuit for 1 million NIS ($272,000) against his driver, who allegedly recorded the tape.[7]

He previously worked as social media director for Shurat HaDin, an Israeli NGO that provides legal services to victims of terrorist attacks. Netanyahu was put on leave in March 2019 after deriding President Reuven Rivlin for his work on Arab-Israeli coexistence.[8] In December 2018, he was suspended from Facebook for 24 hours after posting anti-Muslim content.[9][10] Among the comments was that "There will never be peace with those monsters in the form of men that have called themselves ‘Palestinians’ since 1964".[11] Some observers have hypothesized that Netanyahu is looking for a job in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,[12] although Netanyahu denies that he is looking for a political career.[11] In June 2019, it was reported that Netanyahu met with Katrina Pierson, a senior advisor for the Trump 2020 campaign.[8]

He has published op-eds, for instance at Breitbart.[13]

Netanyahu lives at Beit Aghion, the prime minister's official residence in Jerusalem.[3]

In May 2019, Netanyahu expressed support for right-wing nationalist figures Viktor Orbán, Matteo Salvini, Nigel Farage and Geert Wilders in the 2019 European Parliament election.[14]

On 7 July 2019, he won a libel suit against Israeli Labor Party activist Abie Binyamin for the claim that Netanyahu was hiding millions in offshore accounts.[15]

In September 2019, Netanyahu accused the assassinated former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin of having "murdered Holocaust survivors on the Altalena". The comments were disavowed by his father.[16][17][18] He has compared Roni Alsheikh, the Israel Police chief who played a role in the Netanyahu corruption investigations, to the fictional mobster Tony Soprano.[11] While being questioned by police during the investigations, Netanyahu called the police "Stasi" and "Gestapo" and said they were worse than the mafia. He also accused Nir Hafetz and Gideon Saar of various crimes.[19]

In November 2019 Netanyahu was sued for slander after sharing a Facebook post claiming that former Walla news site editor, Avi Alkalay, was a plant for the Wexner Foundation.[20] In February 2020, he was ordered to pay damages and legal costs totalling $81,000. [21] [22]

The neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer once described itself as "The World’s #1 Yair Netanyahu fansite" after he posted a meme portraying his father's political opponents as puppets controlled by George Soros. Netanyahu later deleted the post following backlash.[11]

In November 2020, Netanyahu launched his own right-wing podcast called The Yair Netanyahu Show, with episodes spoken in both English and Hebrew.[23] His first guest was Brazilian politician Eduardo Bolsonaro, who is also the son of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.[24]