Avigdor Lieberman

Avigdor Lieberman was born in 1958 in Chișinău

Lieberman was born Evet Lieberman in Chișinău, in Soviet Moldova, to a Russian-speaking Jewish family. His father Lev was a writer who had been exiled to Siberia. As a young man he studied at the Chișinău Agriculture Institute and wrote a play.

He moved to Israel with his family in 1978, learned Hebrew at an ulpan and took the name Avigdor. After his army service he earned a BA in international relations and political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He married Ella in 1981, and since 1988 the family has lived in Nokdim.

In 1988 he began working with Benjamin Netanyahu. He was director-general of the Likud from 1993 and director-general of the Prime Minister's Office from 1996 to 1997. In 1999 he founded Yisrael Beiteinu and entered the Knesset.

He served as minister of national infrastructure, minister of transport and minister of strategic affairs, and twice as deputy prime minister. He was foreign minister from 2009 to 2012 and from 2013 to 2015, and defense minister from 2016 to 2018. He resigned as foreign minister in 2012 after an indictment and returned in 2013 after he was acquitted.

In 2018 he resigned as defense minister over a ceasefire in Gaza. He was minister of finance from 2021 to 2022. His 2004 plan proposed land swaps with the Palestinian Authority.