Female Models in Israeli Politics: from the Runway to TV, and from the Small Screen to the Knesset

Abstract

Since the late 1990s, four former fashion models and television presenters have decided to join the Israeli political sphere, running as candidates for the Knesset (Israeli parliament). With rather lacklustre careers in the fashion industry, and having hosted low-rating television programmes in marginal time slots for at least a few years, they all seemed to achieve much more in politics than their status in television could have led us to expect. Two of them, Anastasia Michaeli and Orly Levi, were successfully elected, becoming active legislators and enjoying extensive media attention, while the others failed in their attempt to become professional politicians. The transition of these former models to politics can be seen as part of a wider phenomenon of Israeli media celebrities’ conversion to professional politicians. Yair Lapid, a television presenter who became Israel’s Finance Minister in 2013 after launching his own political party,2 and Shelly Yachimowich, a journalist and television and radio commentator who became the Israeli Labor Party leader in 2011, are often regarded as the most visible figures among media celebrities who have turned into professional politicians. While the transition of a former journalist to politics is not perceived as a break from past practices, the fashion models’ transition to politics was seen by the media and commentators as a new phenomenon in the Israeli political landscape.