Yaakov Saar · CC BY-SA 3.0

Ehud Barak rose through the Israel Defense Forces over 35 years to become Chief of the General Staff, leading operations including the 1976 Entebbe raid, and shares the distinction of being the most highly decorated soldier in Israeli history. He entered politics after Yitzhak Rabin's assassination, serving as foreign minister and Labor Party leader before becoming prime minister in 1999. He holds a physics and mathematics degree from Hebrew University and a master's from Stanford.