Meet Israel’s First Female Muslim Diplomat

April 13, 2017

by: Ilse Posselt

Thursday, 13 April 2017 | Calling Israel an apartheid state is a favorite accusation of those who wish to paint a picture of the Jewish state as a cruel, domineering oppressor of human rights. Yet those who wish to peddle the apartheid slander as truth often have a few realities to explain away. Chief among these are Palestinians filling top ranks in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), heading up big corporations or serving as Supreme Court judges and leading academics and doctors.

Now those who try to accuse Israel of being an apartheid state have another bit of truth to contend with: Rasha Atamny, the Jewish state’s very first female Muslim diplomat.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry last week appointed the 31-year-old Atamny to represent the Jewish state in its embassy in Ankara, Turkey. Atamny, who is currently in the process of completing the Foreign Ministry’s renowned cadet course, will join the embassy as the first secretary.

According to Reuters, Atamny will serve as part of a mission tasked with “nurturing one of the country’s most fragile relationships.” Israel and Turkey signed a reconciliation agreement in June 2016 which marked the end of a six-year diplomatic rift.

Atamny hails from the small central Israeli town of Baq al-Gharbiya. She studied psychology at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem where she joined the school’s Model United Nations (UN) club to hone her diplomatic skills. A year after joining the club, Atamny applied for a three-month stint to represent Israel as a youth ambassador at the UN in New York City and was awarded the coveted position.

According to Atamny’s personal blog written during her three months in New York City, her experience as part of the Israel delegation at the UN inspired her to become a diplomat.

“One day, I sat down in my usual seat in the Human Rights Committee and listened with great interest to a discussion taking place on women’s rights violations. At this point,” Atamny wrote in Hebrew, “I had gotten used to the continuous barrage of accusations leveled against Israel. The discrimination against Israel in the UN is very obvious and disappointing.”

“But this time it was different,” she wrote. “This time I listened to speeches by Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and Egypt, all decrying the ‘systematic women’s rights violations’ by Israel while I, an Arab, Muslim Palestinian origin, represent Israel at the UN Human Rights Council.”

“That day at the UN made me desperately disappointed and pushed me to take matters into my own hands, to try and at least object in thought to the systemic conduct carried out in the international arena against Israel.”

Although Atamny is the first Israeli Muslim female to fill a diplomatic position for the Jewish state abroad, she is not the first Arab female diplomat. Rania Jubran, a Christian Arab and daughter of the Supreme Court Justice, Salim Jubran, served in the Foreign Ministry from 2006 – 2009. She resigned shortly before being sent to the Israeli mission in Cairo. The Jewish state also has a number of Arab male Muslim and Christian diplomats serving in the Foreign Ministry—at home and abroad.

Posted on April 13, 2017

Source: (Bridges for Peace, 13 April 2017)

Photo Credit: Rasha Atamny/ Facebook