AHC: POTUS Benjamin Netanyahu

[Historico]

Netanyahu was born in 1949 in Tel Aviv to Zila (née Segal) (1912–2000) and professor Benzion Netanyahu (b. 1910 in Warsaw, Poland), the middle child of three children. He was initially raised and educated in Jerusalem. Between 1956 and 1958, and again in 1963–67,[10] his family lived in the United States in Cheltenham, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia, where he attended and graduated from the Cheltenham High School and was active in a debate club. To this day, he speaks American English with a Philadelphia accent.[11]

After graduating from high school in 1967, Netanyahu returned to Israel to enlist in the IDF. He trained as a combat soldier and became a team leader in an elite special forces unit of the IDF, Sayeret Matkal. He was involved in many missions, including the rescue of the hijacked Sabena Flight 571 in May 1972 in which he was wounded by friendly fire.[12] During the 1973 Yom Kippur War, he fought in special forces raids along the Suez Canal, and then led a commando team deep into Syrian territory.

After his army service Netanyahu returned to the United States, studied and earned a B.S. degree in architecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology[13] in 1975, an M.S. degree from the MIT Sloan School of Management in 1977, and studied political science at Harvard University. At that time he changed his name to Benjamin Ben Nitai (Nitai, a reference to both Mount Nitai and to the eponymous Jewish sage Nittai of Arbela, was a pen name often used by his father for articles).[11] Years later, in an interview with the media, Netanyahu clarified that he decided to do so to make it easier for Americans to pronounce his name. This fact has been used by his political rivals to accuse him indirectly of a lack of Israeli national identity and loyalty.[14]

In 1976 Netanyahu lost his older brother Yonatan Netanyahu, who served as the commander of the elite Israeli army commando unit Sayeret Matkal and was killed in action during the counter-terrorism hostage-rescue mission Operation Entebbe in which his unit rescued more than 100 hostages hijacked and flown to the Entebbe Airport in Uganda.

While studying Netanyahu worked at the Boston Consulting Group in Boston, Massachusetts.

I found this little tidbit later extremely interesting, and I'm surprised no one's really brought it up for...So AH.com, your challenge is to come up with a plausible way for Bibi to the nation's first Jewish President. His home state can either be Pennsylvania or Massachusetts(I prefer PA, greater connection with WWC voters),can be of either party, but has to be elected President in either 1996 or 2008(or both for extra cool points lol)...So Please Discuss

 

[Baruch]

Unless we move his parents to the US and have him born here, won't work.


I like the dude a lot, and if it weren't for that pesky constitution thing, I think he would be an excellent choice.

 

[Tim Thomason]

It's a easier to make his brother (Yonatan) President.

Of course, Benzion, as a professor, worked in the US alot. It's possible that Benjamin was conceived in the US. If Benzion didn't return to Israel in '49 to accept that Encyclopedia job, then he might have remained at Dropsie College, where Benjamin would've been born in Philadelphia.

Born and raised in Philadelphia, the only thing we'd have to due is make sure 18-year-old Benjamin *doesn't* enlist with the IDF in 1967. Because I can't imagine an Israeli soldier becoming a successful American politician. Oh wait...

But yeah, he can fight in the Six-Day War. Have his brother survive to carry on the Netanyahu name in Israel, and Benjamin can remain a Boston-area consultant. Maybe get a job in Edward Brooke's office, move to the Hill, get a job in the Reagan White House, get pushed into a Congress in some state he never really lived in (New York is likely), then use that as a jumping point into higher politics (Senate, Governorship, Presidency).

 

[Revolutionary Avocado]

I found this little tidbit later extremely interesting, and I'm surprised no one's really brought it up for...So AH.com, your challenge is to come up with a plausible way for Bibi to the nation's first Jewish President. His home state can either be Pennsylvania or Massachusetts(I prefer PA, greater connection with WWC voters),can be of either party, but has to be elected President in either 1996 or 2008(or both for extra cool points lol)...So Please Discuss

Benzion and Zila Netanyahu travel to the United States in 1949 for six months, during which a son is born, named "Binyamin". Born on American soil, Binyamin, or Benjamin, is an American citizen. After traveling back to Israel for several years, the Netanyahu family will move permanently to the United States in 1955 after Benzion is invited to do research at the University of Pennsylvania. Netanyahu will grow up with a firm sense of his dual identity, but will more and more come to identify himself as a Jewish-American. In high school, he is heavily involved with the school's debating team, and there becomes intrigued by politics. He will, in 1966, volunteer with the election campaign of Democrat Milton Shapp for the office of Governor of Pennsylvania. Shapp will lose the election, but Netanyahu will remain interested in politics.

In 1967, Netanyahu's parents, both staunch Republicans, are mortified when their son Benjamin announces that he will not be returning to Israel to join the IDF but will instead be joining the ROTC. After four years at Columbia University, studying as a political science major, Netanyahu will be slotted into intelligence, where he will spend the next 7 years. After receiving an honourable discharge from the Army as a major in 1978, Netanyahu will obtain a master's degree in public policy from the University of Pennsylvania. In 1980, Netanyahu, a fiscally conservative Democrat, will run for city council in Philadelphia, where he will make a name for himself as a man of high intelligence. Netanyahu will then, in 1982, run for the state senate and will manage to upset the Republican incumbent in the 2nd District. After 4 years in the state Senate, in 1986, Netanyahu will challenge Republican incumbent Arlen Specter for a Senate seat, where he will lose in the primary to Bob Edgar. Having given up his Senate seat to challenge Specter, Netanyahu will spend the next six years building a base of support, as well as working as a policy advisor to the Democratic governor of Pennsylvania Bob Casey, alongside James Carville. The two men will build a strong friendship over the next 6 years.

In 1992, Netanyahu will be swept into the Senate on a wave caused by Bill Clinton's election, helped also by Arlen Specter's tragic death in a car accident the year before and a raucous Republican primary. Netanyahu will spend the next 12 years in the Senate, winning re-election twice, before running in the Democratic primary in 2004 for the nomination for President. He will withdraw from the race and endorse John Kerry, who will lose the election to President Bush. Netanyahu will win re-election in the Senate for a third term, having been the only member of the Senate other than Barack Obama of Illinois to vote against the Iraq War, due to his pro-Israel but otherwise often isolationist tendencies.

Tragedy will strike the Democratic Party in 2006 after Hillary Clinton, along with her daughter Chelsea and 110 other passengers, will lose their lives in a tragic plane crash caused by equipment failure. This leaves the Democratic field wide open. Barack Obama will refuse to run, and Netanyahu will manage to capture the nomination, choosing conservative Senator Ben Nelson as his running mate to balance the ticket. The Republican field will produce John McCain as the candidate, who will choose former Secretary of State Condeleeza Rice as his running mate. After a major banking crisis begins, Netanyahu, who has studied the financial system as a significant part of his policy background, will boldly propose nationalization of the failing banks and a re-institution of Glass-Stegal. McCain will infamously stumble, first calling Netanyahu's plan "socialism" and later adopting a similar plan. Combined with fatigue with the Republicans, Netanyahu will win the election and become the first Jewish-American president of the united States in 2008.