Decades-Long Netanyahu Confidant Ronald Lauder Breaks His Silence, Urges Israelis to Vote Him Out

Ronald Lauder, the billionaire World Jewish Congress president and a longtime Netanyahu confidant, publicly broke roughly three decades of near-silence on their relationship to warn Israelis against reelecting the prime minister, in an interview with Haaretz published October 23, according to a report by The Times of Israel. Lauder described the current government's conduct as autocratic, saying "what we're seeing now feels more like a banana republic," and blamed Netanyahu for allowing far-right ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich to damage Israel's standing abroad.

Lauder said Israel has lost support across the American political spectrum and among diaspora Jewish communities, and revealed previously unknown details of a 1990s back-channel effort he mediated between Netanyahu and Syrian president Hafez al-Assad, including a draft agreement involving an Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights that he said Netanyahu ultimately abandoned, citing a need for then-opposition leader Ariel Sharon's approval first. Lauder said he still holds both copies of the final proposed agreement.

The two men's friendship cooled after Netanyahu's 1996 marriage to Sara Netanyahu, Lauder said, describing requests for expensive gifts he declined, and later soured further after Lauder became the controlling shareholder of Channel 10, a network Netanyahu has repeatedly accused of unfavorable coverage.

Lauder said he will not vote in the October 27 election out of frustration with Israeli politics, but that he would back Yashar leader Gadi Eisenkot if forced to choose. He added that he has sold all his Israeli properties and has "no intention of going back to Israel. Zero."