Itamar Ben-Gvir: Israel's Far-Right Face or the Country's True Reflection?

In recent weeks, Israel's National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has exposed a version of "modern Israel" the world had hoped to avoid. From declaring he would "not allow" a ceasefire deal between the U.S. and Iran if it harmed Israel, to deliberately harassing activists from the Global Sumud Flotilla on live television, Ben-Gvir's actions have sparked global outrage.

There has been a tendency to view the leader of the far-right Jewish Power party as a political outlier within Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's ruling coalition, aiming to protect the government's image and maintain international cooperation despite growing criticism. However, after Britain, France, Italy, Canada, and even top Israeli allies in the U.S. publicly condemned Ben-Gvir's behavior, Netanyahu was forced to acknowledge the damage, calling the incident "incompatible with Israel's values and norms."

Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar went further, accusing his cabinet colleague of deliberately harming the state and asserting that "Ben-Gvir is not the face of Israel." Many Israeli media outlets also quickly distanced him from the national image, but according to analysts, the opposite is true: Ben-Gvir is the face of an increasingly dominant segment of Israeli society.

"He's stupid, which means he doesn't act alone," lawmaker Aida Touma-Sliman (Hadash party, left-wing) told Al Jazeera. "Everything he does is aided by other politicians and officials who share his beliefs. He couldn't do it without them."

The far-right provocateur, previously convicted of inciting violence, has gained near-total control over the police and prison system since becoming National Security Minister (a newly created role) in 2022. "If just one police officer said no, if the head of the prison authority said no to starving, torturing, and sexually abusing prisoners, things would be different," Touma-Sliman emphasized.

Forged in Division

Ben-Gvir was no stranger when he joined the government in 2022. He first gained national notoriety in 1995, after Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin signed the Oslo Accords. The then-19-year-old Ben-Gvir grabbed the door handle of Rabin's Cadillac before cameras, declaring: "We got to his car, we will get to him." Rabin was assassinated weeks later by a far-right extremist.

Born in 1976, Ben-Gvir claims he became religious at 12 and radicalized at 14 due to the First Intifada. Former teachers recall him openly supporting the extremist Kach party of Rabbi Meir Kahane. That party was banned in 1988 and designated a terrorist organization in 1994 after the massacre of dozens of Muslim worshippers in Hebron. Ben-Gvir once took his future wife to the grave of murderer Baruch Goldstein on their first date, dressed as him for Purim, and kept his photo on his wall until 2021.

Indicted 53 times, Ben-Gvir later boasted to Haaretz that after successfully dismissing most charges, judges even advised him to study law. However, in 2007, he was convicted of inciting racism and supporting a terrorist organization for carrying signs reading "Expel the Arab enemy" and "Rabbi Kahane was right: Arab MKs are a fifth column."

Despite being blocked by the Israel Bar Association, Ben-Gvir became a lawyer in 2012 and gained fame defending extremist settlers. In 2015, he was photographed at the wedding of Amiram Ben-Uliel, convicted of killing a baby and his parents with firebombs. At the wedding, guests danced with knives, rifles, and firebombs; one repeatedly stabbed the victims' photo. Ben-Gvir defended the gathering, saying "no one recognized it was a photo of the Dawabsheh family."

Lawmaker Ofer Cassif described Ben-Gvir as a "bully" who, for power, "acts like a silent teacher" and is "a violent person, with a criminal record for supporting terrorism and a photo of Baruch Goldstein on the wall."

Politicized Hatred

In 2022, Netanyahu helped push a merger between Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, leader of the far-right Religious Zionist party. They became the third-largest faction in the Knesset, sustaining Netanyahu's coalition and seen as the public face of the far-right ideology's most extreme aspects.

Since then, Ben-Gvir has been accused of shaping the police force in his far-right image. He boasts on social media about worsening detention conditions for Palestinian prisoners, many held without trial, while defending deliberate rape and starvation. He threatens to collapse the coalition if the Gaza campaign scales down and leads multiple incursions into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, defying government policies.

After the October 7, 2023 attack, Ben-Gvir oversaw widespread gun licensing for West Bank settlers, which led to a spike in deadly violence against Palestinians. In April, he celebrated the passage of a death penalty law targeting Palestinians, sparking international outrage.

Former Israeli government adviser Daniel Levy noted that criticism mostly targets his theatrical style, not the abuse itself: "They don't change any policies. No one questions what they're doing in Gaza, the West Bank, the flotilla, Lebanon... Instead, they only ask about the minister's style."

Despite international criticism, Ben-Gvir's support remains solid, even growing as rival Smotrich weakens. Pollster Dahlia Scheindlin argues Ben-Gvir's policies are not significantly more extreme than many in the ruling Likud party. "He represents far-right populist politics of Jewish supremacy, with a theatrical, provocative style familiar to nationalist populist politicians worldwide. His supporters may be secular, traditional, or religious right-wingers who believe Palestinian threats can only be resolved through force and humiliation."

Ben-Gvir was invited to respond to points raised in this article but has not replied.