Arie Ben Tov

Arie Ben Tov was born in 1935 in Galați

Arie Ben Tov, born Edelstein, was born in 1935 in Galați, Romania, to a religious Zionist merchant family. In 1941 his father was sent to a labor camp and the family's property was seized. The family moved to Israel in 1950, and he was sent to a youth group at Kibbutz Hamadia.

He joined the IDF in 1954, serving in Golani and then as a paratrooper officer in Battalion 890. From 1963 to 1967 he studied electrical engineering at the Technion in Haifa. He fought in the Six-Day War and was wounded in the battle of Rafah.

In 1967 he joined Unit 515, later Unit 8200, and in 1969 became head of its engineering branch. He was deputy commander from 1972, including during the Yom Kippur War, and commander from 1976. In 1982 he became Chief Intelligence Officer, and from 1983 he was acting head and then deputy head of Military Intelligence.

He retired from the IDF in 1987 and became CEO and president of the startup DSP, which developed digital speech processing. He left in 1990 for independent ventures. He volunteers with community groups and took up sculpture, showing his work in 2015. He is married to Noa and they have 3 children.