Rafi Peretz

Rafi Peretz was born in 1956 in Jerusalem

Peretz was born in Jerusalem in 1956 to parents who came from Morocco. He grew up in the Kiryat HaYovel neighborhood. He studied at Mercaz HaRav and received rabbinic ordination at Yeshivat HaKotel.

He served in the Israeli Air Force as a helicopter pilot and was discharged as a major. In 1992 he founded the Otzem pre-military academy in Gush Katif, which later moved to Yated and then to Naveh. In 2010 he returned to service as a brigadier general and became Chief Military Rabbi, a post he held until 2016.

In February 2019 he was chosen to lead the Jewish Home party and headed the Union of the Right-Wing Parties list, which won 5 seats. In June 2019 he became Minister of Education in a transitional government. In May 2020 he left the Yamina faction and joined the Netanyahu government as Minister of Jerusalem Affairs and Heritage.

Several of his statements on intermarriage and on gay conversion therapy drew public criticism, and he later said he rejected conversion therapy. In January 2021 he announced his retirement from politics, and his term as minister ended in June 2021. He then headed the Otzem institutions and became a judge on the IDF conversion court.

He is married and has 12 children. He lived in Bnei Atzmon in Gush Katif until the 2005 disengagement and now lives in Naveh.