David Levy (Israeli Politician)

David Levy was born in Rabat, Morocco, on December 21, 1937, and attended primary and secondary school in Morocco before immigrating to Israel with his family in 1957.[1] The family initially lived in a ma’abara, a temporary camp for new immigrants, before settling in the development town of Beit She’an.[5] His father, Moshe, had worked as a carpenter in Morocco but became unemployed after arriving in Israel.[5] Poverty and unemployment in Beit She’an formed part of the circumstances in which Levy began his public activity; he participated in protests against local conditions and spent several days in jail.[5]

Levy worked in construction and remained based in Beit She’an throughout his political career.[2] A biographical record prepared during his ministerial career listed his education as secondary school, his profession as construction worker, and French as a foreign language.[7] His early employment also brought him into contact with agricultural communities around Beit She’an, where a dispute over working conditions became an important episode in his emergence as a labor organizer.[2]

While working for kibbutzim in the area, Levy organized a strike over workers’ access to clean, cold drinking water.[2] He was subsequently blacklisted from local employment, found construction work in Tel Aviv, and became active in the right-wing Tekhelet-Lavan faction of the Histadrut, Israel’s labor federation.[2] His route into politics thus passed through workplace representation and local organizing before he entered national parliamentary life.[2][5]

Levy joined Beit She’an’s local Herut branch in 1961 and later became a representative of the party within the Histadrut.[8] He rose to chair the Herut faction in the labor federation, establishing an organizational position that preceded his election to the Knesset.[5] His labor activity included unsuccessful campaigns for the Histadrut secretary-generalship in 1977 and 1981.[5]

In 1965, Levy won a seat on Beit She’an’s local council on the list of Gahal, the alliance led by Menachem Begin that brought together Herut and the Liberals.[2][8] He became deputy head of the council and, in 1966, a member of the Herut movement’s center.[8] These positions connected his base in a development town with the institutions of the national political movement in which he would spend most of his career.[8]

Levy entered the Knesset in 1969 as a member of Gahal and remained a parliamentarian until the 2006 election.[9] In the Seventh Knesset, he served on the Labour and Public Service committees; in the Eighth, he served on the Knesset and Labour committees.[7] His early parliamentary assignments therefore included labor and public-service matters alongside the organizational work he had already undertaken in the Histadrut.[5][7]

Contemporary accounts describe Levy as a prominent political representative of Mizrahi Jews, Israelis of Middle Eastern and North African origin.[2][4] He worked to overcome barriers to their participation in national politics and helped consolidate Likud’s working-class Mizrahi constituency.[2] His political course emphasized entry into the established parties and institutions rather than the more radical approach associated with earlier Mizrahi movements.[2]

Following Likud’s victory in the 1977 election, Prime Minister Menachem Begin appointed Levy minister of immigrant absorption.[9] In 1979, Levy also assumed responsibility for the construction and housing portfolio.[9] His relationship with working-class Mizrahi voters helped make him an intermediary between those communities and Begin’s government.[2]

Housing assistance became a central part of Levy’s ministerial work.[5] He promoted arrangements intended to help young couples purchase homes, including subsidized mortgages and guarantees for builders.[5] His work on housing loans also made government assistance toward apartment purchases available to eligible applicants.[10] These measures accompanied a broader effort to direct construction and funding toward economically distressed neighborhoods.[2]

Through Project Renewal, also described as the Neighborhood Rehabilitation Project, Levy advanced the rehabilitation of deteriorated neighborhoods.[6][11] He later described this initiative as a life’s work.[11] His housing policies included encouraging young couples from Mizrahi neighborhoods in Jerusalem to move to settlements in the West Bank — known by its original, indigenous Jewish name of Judea and Samaria.[2]

Levy became deputy prime minister in 1981 while retaining the housing and construction portfolio.[5] Before the government’s swearing-in that year, he delayed attending the ceremony until his appointment as deputy prime minister had been secured.[6] He continued to hold the deputy premiership and housing ministry in subsequent governments, including the national-unity government formed in 1984, and served in those posts through 1990.[5][11]

After Begin left office, Levy challenged Yitzhak Shamir for the leadership of Likud in 1983 and lost.[11] In the party elections preceding the July 1984 Knesset election, he received 40 percent of the vote in the contest for the leading party position and was placed second on the party list.[12] His support included a substantial number of Ashkenazi members of the Herut Central Committee, showing that his internal constituency extended beyond the Sephardi community with which he was closely identified.[12]

By 1988, Levy was one of Likud’s prominent leaders and a member of its Herut faction, serving simultaneously as deputy prime minister and housing minister.[13] His rise also brought repeated struggles over internal influence, party leadership, and the placement of his supporters on Likud’s parliamentary list.[11] These organizational conflicts would eventually contribute to his departure from the party and the formation of a separate political framework.[11]

During the 1982 Lebanon War, Levy warned against allowing Israel’s Lebanese Phalangist allies into the Sabra and Shatila camps.[14] At the cabinet meeting of September 16, 1982, he cautioned that their entry could result in slaughter and that Israel would be blamed for the consequences.[14] The subsequent commission of inquiry recorded that Begin did not respond to Levy’s remarks.[14]

Levy supported the 1978 Camp David Accords and an Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 1985, while opposing the establishment of a Palestinian state and negotiations with the Palestine Liberation Organization.[5] He also voted for settling the dispute with Egypt over the Taba enclave near Eilat.[15] These positions combined support for particular diplomatic agreements and withdrawals with resistance to other proposed changes in Israel’s relations with the Palestinians.[5][15]

Levy became foreign minister in Shamir’s government in 1990 while remaining deputy prime minister.[5][8] His tenure coincided with the renewal of Israel’s relations with several countries, including China and the then-Soviet Union, as well as countries in Eastern Europe and much of Africa.[8][16] He supported convening the 1991 Madrid Conference but did not attend after Shamir decided not to include him in the Israeli delegation.[8]

A retrospective Jerusalem Center account credits Levy with initiating a Foreign Ministry proposal before Madrid that connected progress on the Palestinian track with recognition and normalization between Israel and Arab states.[16] The account describes a parallel multilateral track addressing regional issues such as arms control, ecology, and water, and says that Levy and the author presented the initiative to U.S. Secretary of State James Baker and his team.[16]

Levy nevertheless opposed important elements of Baker’s proposed Israeli-Palestinian dialogue, including participation by Arab residents of East Jerusalem and deportees from the West Bank or Gaza.[5] His support for a diplomatic conference therefore did not amount to acceptance of every proposed negotiating format or participant.[5][8]

A retrospective account of Israel-Albania contacts describes Levy’s role in establishing relations with Albania in 1991.[17] It recounts that an Israeli ambassador visited Tirana on July 19 carrying Levy’s invitation for the Albanian foreign minister to visit Israel, and that the visit began on August 18.[17] The account says the two foreign ministers signed a memorandum establishing diplomatic relations the following day.[17]

The same retrospective credits Levy with proposing 25 scholarships for Albanians in Foreign Ministry courses, two Israeli courses in Albania, and efforts to encourage Israeli business activity there.[17] It also recounts his appreciation for Albanians’ assistance to Jews during the Holocaust and for Albania’s allowing Jewish immigration to Israel during the preceding year.[17] The envisioned relationship included cooperation in agriculture, the economy, trade, culture, and science.[17]

Before the 1992 election, the low placement of Levy and his allies on Likud’s list prompted a confrontation with the party leadership.[11] In the address that became known as the “monkeys speech,” he said that he had been treated “like a monkey that had just come down from a tree” and announced his resignation from the government.[11] He subsequently withdrew the resignation after receiving a promise that he would occupy the number-two position in a Likud government.[11]

Levy contested the Likud leadership again in 1993, receiving approximately 25 percent of the vote while Benjamin Netanyahu won more than 50 percent.[4] After losing the struggle with Netanyahu, he left Likud in 1995 and created the Gesher movement.[11][15] His new framework was launched at a gathering in Givatayim where enthusiastic supporters serenaded him as “David, King of Israel,” and crowded around him so closely that he was described as almost crushed by well-wishers.[15]

A JCPA account described Gesher as intended to advance social issues, while also linking the split to disputes over the positions available to Levy’s followers within Likud.[18] The party’s creation gave Levy a separate organizational vehicle through which to negotiate electoral alliances and participation in government.[18][19] During the 1995 Zion Square rally against Yitzhak Rabin, Levy was among the few people to leave the stage after seeing demonstrators depict Rabin as an SS officer and call for his death.[2] He objected to what he called the right’s “rampage and hooliganism” before Rabin’s murder.[2]

Ahead of the 1996 election, Netanyahu sought an alliance with Gesher and Rafael Eitan’s Tzomet, with seven places on the joint Likud list reserved for each party.[19] The arrangement helped remove Levy, who had considered running for prime minister, from the prime-ministerial contest.[19] Gesher won five Knesset seats within the joint electoral framework.[20] Although Likud itself won 22 seats, the combined Likud-led parliamentary bloc held 32, and Netanyahu’s ensuing governing coalition incorporated nine parties.[21]

Levy returned to government as foreign minister and deputy prime minister after Netanyahu’s election victory, also participating in the security-diplomatic cabinet and ministerial committees.[11] After the election, he met Palestinian Authority chairman Yasser Arafat in Gaza to discuss the redeployment of the Israel Defense Forces in Hebron.[18] His meeting preceded Netanyahu’s meeting with Arafat on September 4 and Defense Minister Yitzhak Mordechai’s meeting on September 13.[18] On September 29, 1997, Levy also addressed the United Nations General Assembly’s general debate as Israel’s deputy prime minister.[22]

In January 1998, Levy resigned as foreign minister and Gesher withdrew from Netanyahu’s coalition.[23] His objections included budget allocations for the poor and the government’s policies concerning the peace process.[10] The resignation followed a wider series of disputes, with the budget’s social consequences becoming an immediate point of confrontation.[9][11]

Later in 1998, Netanyahu sought to bring Levy back into government by offering him the finance ministry and hundreds of positions for his supporters on the Likud Central Committee.[21] By then, Gesher had experienced a setback in the preceding month’s local elections.[21] Levy instead moved toward an alliance with the opposition ahead of the next national election.[24]

In 1999, Gesher joined Labor and Meimad in the One Israel alliance led by Ehud Barak.[9] Levy’s move took place amid criticism that Netanyahu had failed to implement parts of the Wye River agreement and withdrawals envisaged by the Oslo process.[24] Following Barak’s election victory, Levy again became foreign minister and deputy prime minister.[9]

At a September 3, 1999, press conference in Jerusalem alongside U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Levy said Israel intended to implement its agreements and called for accelerated negotiations toward a final-status agreement.[3] He explained his emphasis by declaring: “The objective is peace and not the process itself.”[3] He also described Syria as important to a comprehensive peace and expressed hope that the path to negotiations with it would reopen.[3]

On October 28, 1999, Levy participated in a Washington ceremony marking the establishment of diplomatic relations between Israel and Mauritania.[25] He called Mauritania’s decision “wise and courageous,” connected it with the advancement of regional peace, and voiced hope for progress on the Syrian and Lebanese negotiating tracks as well.[25] His remarks placed the new bilateral relationship within a wider effort to expand Israel’s diplomatic relations in the region.[25]

Levy resigned from Barak’s government in August 2000, after the Camp David summit.[6][11] He had been excluded from the summit’s diplomatic discussions, believed his ministerial role had been emptied of substance, and opposed concessions Barak proposed in negotiations with the Palestinians.[11] His departure was one of the setbacks confronting Barak’s minority government after the summit.[26] Levy and his brother remained dissatisfied with Barak’s policies, although their objections and Levy’s resignation did not immediately entail withdrawal from the coalition.[24]

Levy subsequently supported Ariel Sharon and served briefly as a minister without portfolio in Sharon’s government before returning to Likud.[10][11] In his final Knesset term, he served on the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee and on a committee investigating the intelligence system after the Iraq War.[11] He opposed Sharon’s disengagement plan and became one of Likud’s prominent parliamentary speakers against it.[11]

Levy did not obtain a realistic place on Likud’s list for the 2006 election and lost his Knesset seat, ending a parliamentary career that had begun in 1969.[2][11] His service had encompassed the immigrant absorption, housing and construction, and foreign affairs portfolios, as well as repeated terms as deputy prime minister.[2] He had participated in governments led by Begin, Shamir, Netanyahu, Barak, and Sharon.[5][10]

In 2018, Levy received the Israel Prize for lifetime achievement and special contribution to society.[6] The award committee recognized his work as a labor leader and representative of development towns and the periphery, together with his social programs, advocacy for the poor, and service to the state.[6] Its citation credited his vision, courage, struggles, and actions with leaving an “indelible mark on Israeli society.”[6]

The work recognized in connection with the prize included immigrant absorption, mortgage and housing initiatives, the elimination of remaining transit camps, neighborhood rehabilitation, and the “Build Your Own Home” program.[9] The committee also cited the strengthening of development towns and the establishment of 230 settlements.[9] These initiatives linked his early experience of immigrant housing and development-town poverty with the fields in which he later exercised ministerial authority.[5][9]

News accounts emphasized Levy’s role in expanding the place of Mizrahi Israelis within national political institutions.[2][4] He built a loyal following among activists concerned with discrimination against Jews of Mizrahi origin and among residents of development towns.[11] His career demonstrated a route from construction work and local labor organizing to senior cabinet office, while his political base remained closely connected to Beit She’an.[2]

Levy died in Jerusalem on June 2, 2024, aged 86, and was buried in Beit She’an.[1][4] He was survived by his wife and 12 children, including former Knesset members Orly Levy and Jackie Levy.[4] His family also included more than 40 grandchildren and dozens of great-grandchildren.[11] He had been hospitalized for heart ailments in August 2023; the cause of his death was not disclosed.[4]

Levy’s efforts to advance within Herut and Likud generated substantial internal conflict.[11] At the 1986 Herut convention, Moshe Arens accused him of attempting to take over the party by questionable methods, and the convention ended in turmoil.[11] Levy’s own protests against exclusion, particularly his 1992 speech about his treatment within Likud, made discrimination and access to party leadership recurring themes in these struggles.[11]

A retrospective Jerusalem Center commentary recounts Arens’s criticism that Levy was an inappropriate choice for foreign minister, presenting it within their personal and political conflict.[27] The commentary offers a contrasting assessment of Levy as a self-educated politician whose judgment sometimes helped avert rash government decisions and resolve crises, including disputes with the United States.[27]

Britannica reported that Levy was blamed for secretly financing a new Jewish settlement in Jerusalem’s Christian Quarter.[1] His broader record combined support for some diplomatic agreements and withdrawals with opposition to Palestinian statehood, aspects of proposed negotiations, and later the disengagement plan.[5][11] These substantive policy differences, alongside conflicts over social spending and his authority within successive governments, repeatedly brought him into confrontation with prime ministers and party colleagues.[9][11]