Gideon Raff

Gideon "Gidi" Raff (Hebrew: גדעון "גידי" רף‎; born 1973) is an Israeli film and television director, screenwriter, and writer. He is best known for his creation of the Channel 2 thriller drama series Prisoners of War. 2Early life Raff was born in Jerusalem. His father is Eitan Raff, who served as Accountant General in the Israeli Ministry of Finance, was Chairman of the Board of Bank Leumi and, as of August 2017, was under criminal investigation for having aided US customers in tax evasion. From the ages of two to six he lived in Washington, D.C., where his father was Economic Adviser to the Israeli Embassy. After serving three years as a paratrooper in the Israel Defense Forces, he completed a degree in film at Tel Aviv University. Raff then worked in IT. For a year or so, during the dot-com bubble, he was responsible for content at a startup company, and wrote a weekly column in Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv about his experiences. The columns were collected into a book, Diary of a Start-Upper On The Way To The Maka (Exit) (Keter, 2001). 2Film and television career Raff moved to Los Angeles and, in 2003, completed a graduate degree in directing at the American Film Institute. His graduation short film The Babysitter premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, following which director Doug Liman hired him as director's assistant on the 2005 film M