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| - Israel's former army chief Benny Gantz, sworn in as alternate prime minister in a unity government on Sunday, acquired a reputation as an elite military officer with a relaxed, deliberate manner. The 60-year-old, also Israel's new defence minister, has been in the public eye since first declaring political ambitions and running for office against right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in December 2018. Within months, his centrist Blue and White party shocked Israeli politics by matching Netanyahu's right-wing Likud in polls last April and then edging slightly ahead of it in September. But neither party was able to gain the support of more than half the 120 MPs in the country's proportional system, forcing yet another election on March 2, the third within less than a year. Gantz had campaigned on an anti-corruption message against a prime minister indicted for bribery, fraud and breach of trust. Netanyahu denies any wrongdoing. After the March vote, anti-Netanyahu forces, despite their deep divisions, unanimously rallied behind Gantz and recommended him to form a government. Facing dim prospects of actually forming a government given the fractured anti-Netanyahu bloc, Gantz was elected parliament speaker in March and said he would use that powerful position to seek a unity deal with Netanyahu. "These are unusual times and they call for unusual decisions," he said at the time. Weeks later, he signed a coalition deal with Netanyahu, a move that triggered the defection of senior Blue and White leaders who accused Gantz of betrayal. Under the three-year coalition deal, Netanyahu will stay in office for 18 months, with Gantz as his alternate, a new position in Israeli governance. If the government does not collapse, Gantz will take over as prime minister in 18 months, replacing Netanyahu who has held the position since 2009. Gantz was born on June 9, 1959, in the southern village of Kfar Ahim, which his immigrant parents, both Holocaust survivors, helped establish. He joined the army in 1977 and went on to command Shaldag, an air force special operations unit. Standing well over six feet (1.82 metres) tall, he earned the military nickname "Benny-huta", a play on a word meaning "no rush" and reflecting his relaxed character. In 1994, he returned to the army to command a brigade and then a division in the occupied West Bank, before serving as Israel's military attaché to the United States from 2005 until 2009. He was the army's chief of staff from 2011 until his retirement in 2015, working closely with Netanyahu. In 2014, he commanded the army's operations in the war with Gaza's Islamist rulers Hamas and has boasted of the number of Palestinian militants killed and targets destroyed. Gantz has kept his positions vague in several key areas, including the moribund peace process with the Palestinians. Like Netanyahu, he was quick to endorse US President Donald Trump's controversial peace plan, viewed as overwhelmingly pro-Israeli and firmly rejected by the Palestinians. But while calling it a "historic milestone", he also seemed to hint at reservations. Gantz has raised concern over unilateral moves by Israel that could inflame regional tensions. There is increasing evidence that Israeli action to annex settlements and other territory in the occupied West Bank, approved in the Trump plan, would cause international uproar. Gantz had said that the Trump plan must be implemented "in tandem with the other countries in our region". Some saw the idea of "in tandem" with neighbouring Arab states and the Palestinians as a tactic to bury the plan indefinitely. But security hawk Gantz, like Netanyahu, has insisted the West Bank's strategic Jordan Valley must remain under Israeli control. bur/bs/sw
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