Aida Touma-Sliman

Aida Touma-Suleiman (Arabic: عايدة توما سليمان‎, Hebrew: עאידה תומא סלימאן; born 16 July 1964) is an Israeli Arab journalist and politician.

Aida Touma-Suleiman was born in Nazareth, Israel, into a Christian Arab family, and gained a B.A. in psychology and Arabic literature from the University of Haifa. Touma-Suleiman lives in Acre with her two daughters. Her husband Jiris Suleiman died from cancer in 2011.

Touma-Suleiman founded the Arab feminist group Women Against Violence in 1992, and has been its CEO since its foundation. She joined the Hadash party, later becoming editor in chief of Al-Ittihad, an Arabic language newspaper owned by the Israeli Communist Party, a faction in Hadash. She also became the first female member of the High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of Israel. She also co-found the International Women's Commission for a Just Palestinian-Israeli Peace.

She was placed 47th on its list for the 1992 elections, in which it won only three seats. She was 36th on the Hadash-Balad for the 1996 elections, although the alliance won only five seats. In the next elections in 1999, she was 28th on the Hadash list, again failing to enter the Knesset.

The 2009 elections saw her placed fifth on the Hadash list, but the party won only four seats. After contesting the second place on the party's list for the 2013 elections against the incumbent Hana Sweid, a victory for Sweid meant that she was placed 98th on the party's list.

Prior to the 2015 elections, Hadash joined the Joint List, an alliance with Balad, the United Arab List, and Ta'al. Touma-Suleiman was placed fifth on the Joint List list, and was elected to the Knesset as the alliance won 13 seats. She is also only the fourth Arab Israeli woman to become a member of the Knesset, following Hussniya Jabara (Meretz), Hanin Zoabi (Joint Arab List), and Nadia Hilou (Labor).

Speaking in the Knesset, she has shared her views on the path to peace: "The Palestinian people will continue to struggle as long as there's an occupation. The only way for true humane security for the two peoples consists of an end to the occupation and establishing a Palestinian state with its capital in eastern Jerusalem."

In June 2015, she was elected to head the Knesset's Committee on the Status of Women and Gender Equality. Suleiman was appointed to this position through a unanimous vote. She has attended hearings of the committee since 1992. Suleiman noted that she is planning for cooperative efforts with the Ministry for Social Equality head, Gila Gamliel, who is also responsible for gender equality.

In an interview with an American Jewish student newspaper in 2016, Suleiman explained in "eloquent" English that she condemned Saudi Arabia and other gulf nations that support such terrorist organizations as ISIS. She also spoke of Hezbollah, Israel, and the current situation: "As a woman living in a place that suffered Hezbollah's bombardment, when there was a need to condemn the bombing of a civilian population, we were the first to do so. And when it was necessary to condemn the Israeli government - we did that too. I believe that this gives us the right to make complex observations, since the situation is complex." In 2019, she was critical of Arab countries normalizing diplomatic ties with Netanyahu and said it was important for Palestinians to preserve their Arab identity.

Controversy

In 2020, after being reelected to the Knesset during the COVID-19 pandemic, Touma-Suleiman tweeted a video of a disinfection of a West Bank checkpoint with the commentary, "Another atrocity by the occupation under the cover of the coronavirus — the IDF is spraying Palestinians at the Qalqilya checkpoint with an unknown substance. Everyone agrees the spraying method is not effective in the fight against the virus. The horrors being committed under the cover of the crisis can’t be ignored." The video actually showed Palestinian Authority employees disinfecting the Palestinian side of the checkpoint to combat coronavirus. Yamina MK Naftali Bennett responded to the tweet with his own tweet calling Touma-Suleiman "a liar, anti-Semitic and contemptible." Touma-Suleiman deleted the tweet and claimed she had been "misled." She added, "At least I have the courage and the integrity to admit mistakes. You continue to callously lie even when the truth is clear."