MIAMI, FLORIDA: Yair Netanyahu, the son of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has come under heavy criticism from Israeli soldiers for abandoning them by staying in Miami while thousands of reservists returned home to fight in the war against Hamas.
The 32-year-old Yair, whom Netanyahu shares with his second wife Sara, reportedly moved to Florida in April after his father warned him not to make divisive remarks on social media, which led to numerous defamation lawsuits against him.
Netanyahu majored in theater at the High School for the Arts in Jerusalem before undertaking compulsory military service and serving in the spokesman's unit of IDF.
Additionally, he attended the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) in Herzliya, where he earned a Master of Arts in Government Studies.
Yair previously provoked fierce outrage when he called the hundreds of thousands of Israelis who demonstrated against the government's Supreme Court reform "terrorists" and claimed that the US was orchestrating the demonstrations.
In 2018, Facebook reportedly banned Yair he wrote a post, saying "All Muslims should leave Israel." He, in another post, mentioned that there were only two possible solutions for peace in the country, and that is either "all Jews leave or all Muslims leave" the country.
In August 2023, a judge ordered him to pay nearly $34,000 in compensation and $6,000 in legal fees in August to a lady he said was having an affair with his father's political rival, as per Daily Mail.
What did Israeli soldiers say about Yair Netanyahu?
Several Israeli soldiers accused of Yair hiding in Miami while an unprecedented 360,000 reservists returned home to fight in deadly, which was sparked after Hamas’ brutal October 7 attack, when the millitant organization bombarded the country with nearly 2000 missiles and launched dozens of ground attacks.
“Yair is enjoying his life at Miami Beach while I'm on the front lines,” one soldier, a volunteer serving on Israel's northern front, told The Times.
The soldiers said that the citizens are suffering due to this war instead of the people who caused it. “It's us who are leaving our work, our families, our kids, to protect our families back home and the country, not the people who are responsible for this situation,” they added.
“Our brothers, our fathers, sons, are all going to the front line, but Yair is still not here. It does not help build trust in the leadership of the country,” the soldier continued.
Another volunteer, deployed to the border with Gaza, slammed Yair saying “I've flown back from the States where I have a job, a life, my family.”
There is no way I can stay there and abandon my country, my people, at this critical time. Where is the prime minister's son? Why isn't he in Israel?”
“It is the most uniting moment for us as Israelis in our recent history and every single one of us should be here right now, including the prime minister's son,” they continued.
Israelis abroad are using WhatsApp chats to organize their return, sharing information on where to find available flights, said Yedidya Shalman, 26, who was in Thailand on his honeymoon when the violence exploded out of Gaza.
“(We) set up WhatsApp groups almost everywhere in the world, we called people to join them and we slowly worked to bring as many reservists as possible back to Israel,” he told Reuters.
