Dalia Itzik

Dalia Ballas Itzik was born in Jerusalem on October 20, 1952, into a family whose parents had immigrated from Iraq.[1] She has described herself as one of eight children and recalled that her family was poor and lived in a small apartment. Her older sisters left school during elementary school to work, while she continued her education.[7]

Itzik attended the religious Evelina de Rothschild high school. She said she cleaned teachers’ homes after school and did not enlist in the army after declaring herself religious; she later described her non-service as a lasting personal regret.[8] She trained at Efrata Teachers Seminary, earned a bachelor’s degree in literature and history from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and later completed a law degree at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya.[1][4]

Teaching was Itzik’s first profession. She became a teacher and principal before becoming active in the Teachers’ Union, and she eventually led the Jerusalem Teachers’ Union for five years.[1][7] In a 2019 interview, she also recalled being seriously injured in a 1988 car crash in which Likud Knesset member Michael Reisser was killed. She said the trauma remained with her and that she had not driven since.[8][9]

Itzik entered Jerusalem municipal politics in 1989, when she was elected to the city council on a list associated with Mayor Teddy Kollek. She later recalled that Kollek had asked her to run and that she secured his promise of the deputy-mayor position before joining his team. As deputy mayor, she was responsible for education.[7][9]

In 1992, Itzik was elected to the 13th Knesset as a Labor Party member. She remained in the Knesset until deciding in 2012 to take time away from political life, representing Labor and later Kadima.[1][10] Her assignments included the Finance Committee from 1992 to 1996, the Education and Culture Committee from 1992 to 1999, and the Committee on the Status of Women from 1992 to 1999. She chaired the Education and Culture Committee from March 1995 to June 1996 and the Special Committee for Research and Scientific Technological Development from July 1997 to June 1999.[4]

Itzik also chaired the Labor Party’s Legislative Panel, served on its Central Committee, and sat on the boards of the Israel Broadcasting Authority, the Jerusalem Theater, and the Gerard Behar Center.[4] She chaired the Knesset’s Science and Technology Committee as well, giving her a broad portfolio in education, science, technology, women’s status, and finance before she entered the cabinet.[1]

Prime Minister Ehud Barak appointed Itzik minister of environmental affairs in 1999; she held the position from July 1999 until March 2001. She was also given responsibility for the Israel Broadcasting Authority.[4][9] In November 1999, the cabinet approved her proposal to establish a 75-member National Environment Council representing public bodies, academia, economic sectors, Knesset members, religious and educational groups, the media, environmental organizations, local authorities, the Jewish National Fund, and youth movements. It was charged with advising on environmental policy, raising public awareness, recommending research, and monitoring Israel’s implementation of international environmental agreements. The proposal called for equal representation of women and men.[11]

As environment minister, Itzik opposed a government-approved 17-kilometer northern segment of the Cross-Israel Highway. She argued that it would seriously damage the environment and said efforts to reduce the harm would continue. The cabinet approved the segment by seven votes to five, with Itzik among those opposing it.[5]

In March 2001, Itzik became minister of industry and trade in the national unity government formed after Ariel Sharon defeated Barak in a special election. She held the portfolio until October 2002, when she resigned with the other Labor ministers. In January 2005, she was appointed minister of communications and served for about ten months.[4][9]

Itzik left Labor at the end of 2005 to join Sharon’s new Kadima party, along with Shimon Peres and Haim Ramon.[1][9] Kadima subsequently led the four-party coalition government approved by the Knesset in May 2006.[12]

In May 2006, Itzik became the first woman Speaker of the Knesset. She held the office during the Seventeenth Knesset, from 2006 to 2009.[2][12] She said she was surprised when Prime Minister Ehud Olmert proposed her for the position because they had previously had political disagreements. She recalled warning him that she would make his life difficult; Olmert replied that he trusted her and asked her to run the Knesset with dignity. She said he allowed her to manage the institution without imposing a legislative agenda.[8]

Itzik recalled that some colleagues questioned whether she could perform the job. As the only woman on the security cabinet, she also heard comments she felt were inappropriate for discussions involving human lives. She said she kept notes documenting remarks such as, “Be nice, but don’t interfere.”[8] In 2008, she was identified alongside Supreme Court president Dorit Beinisch as a woman leading one of Israel’s major national institutions, amid discussion of whether Tzipi Livni might form a government.[13]

Itzik said she arranged for people with disabilities to be employed at the Knesset and remained in contact with some of them. She also supported the compensated departure of employees who did not want to remain in the system and proposed directing the resulting savings toward repairing damage in northern Israel from the Second Lebanon War. When bereaved families protested at the Knesset, including during a speech by Olmert, she instructed staff to remain restrained.[8]

At Israel’s 60th-anniversary celebrations in 2008, Itzik expressed sympathy for the families of those who had died defending Israel since 1948. She described the state as “an unusual success story, a wonder by any historical standard,” while acknowledging that “there are flaws and we still have things to do.”[14]

Itzik performed presidential duties while serving as Knesset speaker after President Moshe Katsav requested a leave of absence. On January 25, 2007, the Knesset House Committee approved his request by a 13–11 vote. Its chair said Itzik would serve as acting president from the moment the leave was approved. Katsav had requested three months of leave or leave until a hearing in his case, whichever came first.[15] A contemporaneous list of Israeli officials also identified Itzik as acting president following Katsav’s temporary suspension.[16]

Katsav had asked to be declared temporarily incapacitated after reports that the attorney general planned to indict him. He denied the charges, and his leave was later extended. A subsequent plea agreement was controversial.[4][12]

Itzik recalled serving as acting president for about half a year while continuing as speaker. She said she used an office in the President’s Residence but refused to sit in Katsav’s chair. Her duties included swearing in foreign ambassadors and reviewing prisoners’ clemency cases. She said she read each file carefully, returned some cases for reconsideration, and recommended clemency for former Knesset member Naomi Blumenthal.[8]

Itzik said her work was judged through a gendered lens, recalling criticism that she wore the same suit at successive ceremonies. She described preparing carefully for visits and events because she believed a mistake could be treated as a failure by women generally.[8] In May 2007, she did not attend an Inter-Parliamentary Union meeting in Indonesia because of security requirements associated with her position as acting president.[12]

After Katsav’s resignation, the Knesset speaker continued to carry out presidential duties until Shimon Peres was elected president.[17] Majalli Wahabi briefly performed those duties while Itzik was outside the country, illustrating that the available accounts concern several related transfers of presidential authority rather than one uninterrupted episode under a single description.[18]

As Knesset speaker, Itzik publicly addressed the treatment of Holocaust survivors in Israel. During a special session in 2007, she apologized on behalf of the state for neglecting survivors’ needs over previous decades. She said that although Israel had demanded reparations from Germany, payments had not been allocated “in a just and logical manner” to those who needed them. The apology followed an agreement by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to increase stipends for needy survivors.[6]

Itzik said: “We are here to rectify the situation so that we may be able to look into the survivors' eyes, and tell them on behalf of Israeli society: 'We apologize'.”[6] The agreement did not resolve benefits for 85,000 people who had fled the Nazi regime but had not been incarcerated in ghettos or camps.[6]

In August 2007, Itzik wrote to European Parliament President Hans-Gert Pöttering asking him to reconsider hosting a conference organized by a United Nations committee in the parliament building in Brussels. Israel’s Foreign Ministry had also raised concerns, and the event drew protests amid accusations that it would have an anti-Israel agenda. The organizers described it as a conference in support of Israeli-Palestinian peace.[19]

Itzik was initially among the sponsors of a Knesset bill imposing sanctions on bodies advocating boycotts of Israel or areas under Israeli control, but she later withdrew her support. Opponents argued that the bill’s definition of boycott was too vague and could restrict freedom of expression. The measure passed its first reading by 32 votes to 12.[20]

A Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs commentary portrayed Itzik as a fervent supporter of Barak and said he used her as a channel for presenting his ideas to the public. In its discussion of Barak’s peace-process policies during a period of mounting terrorism and conflict, it reported that Itzik argued on television that there was no military solution, only a political one.[21]

In 2007, Olmert suggested that Itzik run for president, but she said she declined because she believed the position belonged to Shimon Peres. Seven years later, she entered the 2014 presidential election, saying she believed she was ready for the role and had joined the contest without a party behind her.[8]

Itzik was one of five first-round candidates, alongside Daniel Shechtman, Dalia Dorner, Reuven Rivlin, and Meir Sheetrit. She received 28 votes and finished third. No candidate reached the required 61-vote majority, and Rivlin and Sheetrit advanced to the second round.[3] Rivlin then defeated Sheetrit and was elected president.[3][22]

At the end of 2012, Itzik announced that she was taking time away from public life. She said efforts to unite political forces on the left and center had been undermined by ego and power struggles, and she characterized her decision as a break rather than necessarily a permanent departure.[10] After the Eighteenth Knesset dispersed in early 2013, she described herself as retired from politics.[8]

In 2013, Itzik resigned from Kadima and joined the board of supermarket chain Rami Levy Chain Stores, with reported annual compensation of NIS 100,000.[23] In a 2018 interview, she said she had other business interests and volunteered as president of Hadassah-International Israel. She said the organization was raising funds for a Jerusalem rehabilitation center for soldiers and victims of terror.[7] By 2021, she was described as having served voluntarily since 2016 as chair of the board of trustees of Hadassah International Israel, which supports Hadassah Medical Center.[24]

Itzik identified the extension of maternity leave as a significant achievement of her parliamentary work. She recalled returning to work as a new mother and crying after leaving her child with a caregiver. She said the 24-week leave then available—almost twice its former length, although not all of it was paid—represented a victory after a difficult struggle.[24]

Itzik’s most prominent institutional milestone was becoming the first woman Speaker of the Knesset. Her speakership coincided with a period in which she also carried out the duties of acting president, placing her in two of Israel’s highest public offices during the same broad period.[2][12] Her parliamentary and ministerial work encompassed education, women’s status, science and technology, environmental policy, industry and trade, and communications.[1][4]

Her public profile also included apologizing to Holocaust survivors on behalf of the state,[6] opposing a highway project on environmental grounds,[5] and highlighting maternity-leave legislation as a major achievement.[24] Her 2008 Independence Day remarks combined praise for Israel’s achievements with an acknowledgment that the country still had work to do.[14]

Itzik’s career has frequently been discussed in the context of women’s representation in Israeli public life. Her own recollections describe the scrutiny and gendered expectations she experienced, while contemporary analysis placed her among the women leading major national institutions.[8][13]

Two of Itzik’s interventions involved prominent political disputes. The Brussels conference she opposed was described by its organizers as supporting Israeli-Palestinian peace, while protesters and other critics alleged that it would promote an anti-Israel agenda. Itzik asked the European Parliament’s president to reconsider hosting it.[19]

The proposed anti-boycott bill, which Itzik initially sponsored before withdrawing her support, also drew competing arguments. Opponents said its definition of boycott was vague and threatened freedom of expression, while its sponsors argued that similar sanctions existed elsewhere and were justified as a response to boycotts of Israel.[20]