Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Benjamin Netanyahu’s ‘Friendly’ Dog Sent to Pound After Hanukkah Chomp

Veterinary authorities quarantined the family dog of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after she bit a lawmaker at a Hanukkah reception.

The dog, Kaia, was placed in quarantine Thursday as per health ministry regulations after she bit Sharren Haskel, a Likud member of the Knesset, and another person the previous day at the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerusalem, the news site Ynet reported.

“We had to give away Kaia to be quarantined as legally required,” Netanyahu wrote on his Facebook page. “Following this incident, I became aware of the issue of quarantine regulations for dogs and I found in it problems that conform neither with logic nor compassion.”

He added he would ask officials from the health and agriculture ministries, as well as animal rights groups, to “formulate suggestions to change and improve the existing laws.” Netanyahu ended his post with a greeting and happy Hanukkah “to us all, two and four-legged alike.”

Dogs, cats and other mammalian pets who bit a person are required to be quarantined for 10 days of observation to determine they do not have rabies. In some cases, animals may be quarantined in their owner’s home, but the vast majority of cases — some 3,500 annually — are held in municipal facilities.

According to Ynet, Kaia bit the prime minister in July, shortly after she was adopted, and was not quarantined, though Netanyahu was given anti-rabies shots as a precaution.

Described by the Netanyahus as a “kind and friendly dog,” Kaia, who is 10 years old, suffers from bad hearing which makes her startle and sometimes bite when approached from behind, Ynet reported.

The news site published a picture of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry petting Kaia with Netanyahu during his last visit to Israel. Kerry is seen facing her.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.