‘Bibi’ is selected to TIME’s Top 100 most influential people

Netanyahu was selected as one of TIME’s Top 100 Most Influential people.

By World Israel News Staff

Normally, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wouldn’t be the name one immediately associates with pop star Ariana Grande, actor Dwayne Johnson, or soccer star Alex Morgan, but all have at least one thing in common. They made the list of TIME Magazine’s Top 100 Most Influential People 2019.

Israel’s prime minister thanked TIME in a tweet on Wednesday: “Thank you to TIME International magazine for choosing me as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. I will continue to operate with all my strength for our state.”

TIME asked David French, staff writer for conservative magazine National Review, to write the remarks for the Netanyahu entry on its site. “Israel is Bibi’s nation,” Mr. French says, referring to the prime minister by his nickname.

Despite facing existential dangers, he writes, “Israel grows more prosperous. It grows more powerful. And as the election shows, sufficient numbers of Israelis believe not just that Netanyahu is partly responsible for that success but that he’s the nation’s indispensable man. And so he won again, in spite of facing serious allegations of corruption. Bibi certainly deserves his share of credit for Israel’s strength, but persuading Israelis that he alone could achieve it is his true political accomplishment.”

Prime Minister Netanyahu was recently elected to his fifth term as premier on April 9.

On Tuesday, Israel’s right-wing and religious parties endorsed Netanyahu for another term, giving him an absolute majority of 65 seats in the next Knesset. He needs only 61 seats to cobble together a governing coalition.