'King Bibi' Israel's master of brinkmanship

Some love him, others loathe him, but there is one thing they all agree on: Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu, who formed his third consecutive government Thursday, is a master of political brinkmanship.

The 65-year-old won an election on March 17 that he called two years early, and which was widely seen as a referendum on his six-year tenure as prime minister.

With a wide array of political actors united under the unofficial slogan "Anyone but Bibi," his opponents had smelled victory as polls ahead of the vote showed his rightwing Likud trailing the centre-left Zionist Union.

They were premature in writing him off.

"Bibi" mustered all his political and rhetorical guile to pull off a victory and formed a coalition that gave a key role to the far-right Jewish Home and marked the return of ultra-Orthodox parties to government.

Even so, after outgoing foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman quit the coalition talks, Netanyahu was left with a precarious 61-seat majority.

He was forced to assign key ministries to demanding partners, and is a "general without an army", newspaper Maariv wrote.

- 'Life without Bibi' -

Netanyahu became Israel's youngest prime minister in 1996, serving a first term of three years.

He returned to the post in 2009 and is now on course to become Israel's second-longest serving premier after the Jewish state's founder David Ben Gurion.

The burly premier with his trademark comb-over has left such an impression at home and abroad that newspaper Haaretz said it would be difficult to "imagine life without Netanyahu".

"When Israel loses Bibi, it will surely at times miss having a recognisable leader of international stature that -- love him or hate him -- makes the world sit up and take notice when he speaks out on Iran or any other subject," it wrote ahead of his reelection.
In an election campaign marked by scaremongering, Netanyahu warned that a vote for his rivals would mean a Palestinian capital in annexed east Jerusalem and a halt to settlement construction which would turn the hills surrounding the city into an Islamist haven -- "Hamastan".

In a last-ditch appeal to the far right, he ruled out the establishment of a Palestinian state if reelected, though he has since sought to backtrack.

On election day he warned that Arab Israelis were going to the polls "in droves" -- a comment for which he later apologised.

Netanyahu also caused a stir in Paris in January, inviting himself to an anti-terror demonstration attended by world leaders.

He barged his way to the front of the march, and later urged French Jews to emigrate to Israel, amid fear of rising anti-Semitism in Europe.

Just two weeks before the March 17 vote, Bibi bypassed the White House to speak at Congress, railing against a nuclear deal between world powers and Iran in an address that infuriated President Barack Obama's administration.

- Political veteran -

Born on October 21, 1949, Netanyahu grew up in the United States after his father Bentzion, a history professor, was considered so rightwing in the Labour-dominated Israel of the time that he was forced to leave.

Netanyahu did his military service in an elite commando unit, where he was wounded in combat, then went on to attend the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

His career took off when he was posted to Israel's Washington embassy, later becoming ambassador to the United Nations.
His emergence on the world stage came in 1990 after Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, when he appeared in frequent interviews on CNN.

Always ready with a sound bite in his American-accented English, Netanyahu has never strayed far from the political stage.

Defeated in 1999 by Labour chief Ehud Barak, he stepped down briefly but returned in 2002 to serve under his rightwing successor Ariel Sharon as foreign minister and finance minister.

In late 2005, he took over as Likud leader after Sharon left to found the centrist Kadima, but led the party to a humiliating defeat a year later.

Netanyahu and his wife Sara have two sons and he has a daughter from a previous marriage.