Our first Ethiopian queen

Yityish ‘Titi’ Aynaw, the first Ethiopian Miss Israel, says she wants to use her victory in the beauty pageant as a means to contribute to the community

By SAM SOKOL
Yityish 'Titi' Aynaw (photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem)
Yityish 'Titi' Aynaw
(photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem)
Sitting on a bench in an upscale art gallery on Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff Street, Yityish Aynaw, known to her friends as Titi, poses for photos. Aynaw, with her long legs and alluring smile, is the country’s newest sweetheart: an Ethiopian immigrant who came to Israel an orphan, became an officer in the IDF Military Police and will soon be going on to represent her country in the Miss Universe competition.
After the photo session wraps up, Aynaw – the first member of the Ethiopian Jewish community to win the title of Miss Israel – and I sit down to discuss her victory in that competition and what it says, if anything, about Israeli society.
Sitting on a bed with stuffed animals surrounding her, the 21-year-old beauty queen suddenly looks less like a sex symbol and more like the bright young woman she actually is. She has only been in the country 10 years, though to speak with her you wouldn’t know it: From her army experiences to her lack of any noticeable accent, she seems the quintessential Sabra.
Born and initially raised in Ethiopia, she and her brother came to Israel following the death of their parents and settled in Netanya, where their grandmother was already living. Aynaw joined the IDF after graduating high school and made her way through the officers’ course to become an instructor for military police guarding the entrance to Jerusalem from the West Bank.
Acclimating to Israel was difficult at first, says Aynaw, who was 12 when she arrived, but she picked up the language quickly with the help of a friend.
Following her army discharge, she worked as a saleswoman at a clothing store. While she did think about modeling, she says, she never expected to be Miss Israel.
“I didn’t think about this direction at all. Looking at this world from the outside, there was a lot that didn’t look good. I thought that this wouldn’t be suitable for me, because I was an officer in the army and everything that comes with that, and when my friend came to my house and took me to the competition by force, that is how it started,” she recounts. “I came in, and this world was revealed to me. It looks very materialistic and terribly kitschy, but I can tell you that this isn’t correct.”
Her ascension to the position of Miss Israel became an international news story because of her skin color and because American President Barack Obama invited her to dine with him and President Shimon Peres during this week’s presidential visit.
Following her discussion of that invitation in an interview that ran in last week’s Post, journalists from around the world picked up the story.
At the time, she said she believed she had been invited to meet Obama because they are the first people of African heritage to attain their respective titles, she said, adding that she was “very excited” about the prospect of meeting a leader whose success she cited as a “notable influence on her life.” As a young immigrant, she said, she “never thought that such a thing could happen” to her.
The following morning, her story took on even bigger proportions when she said she would join the growing list of prominent Israelis fighting for American- Jewish spy Jonathan Pollard’s release from a US jail. She told Channel 2 that she planned on asking Obama directly to free the ailing Pollard.
THAT SENSE of responsibility and community service is a persistent theme during our interview, and makes sense given Aynaw’s military service.
Being Miss Israel “is giving me the opportunity to contribute, and it really seems to me that my work is very important,” she says. “I am now starting to get involved with community activities. I go to a lot of events by organizations that donate money to the Israel Defense Forces, and all sorts of things like that.”
She wants to use her position to help establish after-school programs for underprivileged youth, she says.
“This is my goal and what I want to do in this year.”
Now “under pressure” because of her packed schedule of interviews and photo shoots – “I am giving interviews to all sorts of places, even internationally,” she notes – she nonetheless asserts that this is not what she finds important.
“Generally it’s about giving to the community,” she says.
Another issue tightly connected to her victory in the beauty pageant is that of race. However, she says that while she wants to use her position to fight racism in Israeli society, she feels she must emphasize that she is “the representative of all Israelis. I go to the world as Miss Israel, and not as Miss Israel of the Ethiopians.”
When it comes to combating discrimination, she says she has “several ideas.”
Asked if her victory is a sign that Israelis are progressing beyond judging people based on race – an issue that has come up with previous waves of immigration – Aynaw concurs that this is one aspect of the win.
“I am very proud and I was always proud of this [being Ethiopian]. I was almost the only Ethiopian officer on my base,” she recalls, taking further pride in having trained the soldiers who guarded the Jerusalem checkpoint.
“I am very proud, and my community is very proud,” she continues. As she did during the Miss Israel competition, she cites slain American civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. as an inspiration.
“He fought for equality for blacks and whites, because there is no difference between people of flesh and blood, and I think that my victory is another side to that equality,” she says.
Regarding her lack of an accent, Aynaw says she can’t really explain Sitting on a bench in an upscale art gallery on Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff Street, Yityish Aynaw, known to her friends as Titi, poses for photos. Aynaw, with her long legs and alluring smile, is the country’s newest sweetheart: an Ethiopian immigrant who came to Israel an orphan, became an officer in the IDF Military Police and will soon be going on to represent her country in the Miss Universe competition.
After the photo session wraps up, Aynaw – the first member of the Ethiopian Jewish community to win the title of Miss Israel – and I sit down to discuss her victory in that competition and what it says, if anything, about Israeli society.
Sitting on a bed with stuffed animals surrounding her, the 21-year-old beauty queen suddenly looks less like a sex symbol and more like the bright young woman she actually is. She has only been in the country 10 years, though to speak with her you wouldn’t know it: From her army experiences to her lack of any noticeable accent, she seems the quintessential Sabra.
Born and initially raised in Ethiopia, she and her brother came to Israel following the death of their parents and settled in Netanya, where their grandmother was already living. Aynaw joined the IDF after graduating high school and made her way through the officers’ course to become an instructor for military police guarding the entrance to Jerusalem from the West Bank.
Acclimating to Israel was difficult at first, says Aynaw, who was 12 when she arrived, but she picked up the language quickly with the help of a friend.
Following her army discharge, she worked as a saleswoman at a clothing store. While she did think about modeling, she says, she never expected to be Miss Israel.
“I didn’t think about this direction at all. Looking at this world from the outside, there was a lot that didn’t look good. I thought that this wouldn’t be suitable for me, because I was an officer in the army and everything that comes with that, and when my friend came to my house and took me to the competition by force, that is how it started,” she recounts. “I came in, and this world was revealed to me. It looks very materialistic and terribly kitschy, but I can tell you that this isn’t correct.”
Her ascension to the position of Miss Israel became an international news story because of her skin color and because American President Barack Obama invited her to dine with him and President Shimon Peres during this week’s presidential visit.
Following her discussion of that invitation in an interview that ran in last week’s Post, journalists from around the world picked up the story.
At the time, she said she believed she had been invited to meet Obama because they are the first people of African heritage to attain their respective titles, she said, adding that she was “very excited” about the prospect of meeting a leader whose success she cited as a “notable influence on her life.” As a young immigrant, she said, she “never thought that such a thing could happen” to her.
The following morning, her story took on even bigger proportions when she said she would join the growing list of prominent Israelis fighting for American- Jewish spy Jonathan Pollard’s release from a US jail. She told Channel 2 that she planned on asking Obama directly to free the ailing Pollard.
THAT SENSE of responsibility and community service is a persistent theme during our interview, and makes sense given Aynaw’s military service.
Being Miss Israel “is giving me the opportunity to contribute, and it really seems to me that my work is very important,” she says. “I am now starting to get involved with community activities. I go to a lot of events by organizations that donate money to the Israel Defense Forces, and all sorts of things like that.”
She wants to use her position to help establish after-school programs for underprivileged youth, she says.
“This is my goal and what I want to do in this year.”
Now “under pressure” because of her packed schedule of interviews and photo shoots – “I am giving interviews to all sorts of places, even internationally,” she notes – she nonetheless asserts that this is not what she finds important.
“Generally it’s about giving to the community,” she says.
Another issue tightly connected to her victory in the beauty pageant is that of race. However, she says that while she wants to use her position to fight racism in Israeli society, she feels she must emphasize that she is “the representative of all Israelis. I go to the world as Miss Israel, and not as Miss Israel of the Ethiopians.”
When it comes to combating discrimination, she says she has “several ideas.”
Asked if her victory is a sign that Israelis are progressing beyond judging people based on race – an issue that has come up with previous waves of immigration – Aynaw concurs that this is one aspect of the win.
“I am very proud and I was always proud of this [being Ethiopian]. I was almost the only Ethiopian officer on my base,” she recalls, taking further pride in having trained the soldiers who guarded the Jerusalem checkpoint.
“I am very proud, and my community is very proud,” she continues. As she did during the Miss Israel competition, she cites slain American civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. as an inspiration.
“He fought for equality for blacks and whites, because there is no difference between people of flesh and blood, and I think that my victory is another side to that equality,” she says.
Regarding her lack of an accent, Aynaw says she can’t really explainSitting on a bench in an upscale art gallery on Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff Street, Yityish Aynaw, known to her friends as Titi, poses for photos. Aynaw, with her long legs and alluring smile, is the country’s newest sweetheart: an Ethiopian immigrant who came to Israel an orphan, became an officer in the IDF Military Police and will soon be going on to represent her country in the Miss Universe competition.
After the photo session wraps up, Aynaw – the first member of the Ethiopian Jewish community to win the title of Miss Israel – and I sit down to discuss her victory in that competition and what it says, if anything, about Israeli society.
Sitting on a bed with stuffed animals surrounding her, the 21-year-old beauty queen suddenly looks less like a sex symbol and more like the bright young woman she actually is. She has only been in the country 10 years, though to speak with her you wouldn’t know it: From her army experiences to her lack of any noticeable accent, she seems the quintessential Sabra.
Born and initially raised in Ethiopia, she and her brother came to Israel following the death of their parents and settled in Netanya, where their grandmother was already living. Aynaw joined the IDF after graduating high school and made her way through the officers’ course to become an instructor for military police guarding the entrance to Jerusalem from the West Bank.
Acclimating to Israel was difficult at first, says Aynaw, who was 12 when she arrived, but she picked up the language quickly with the help of a friend.
Following her army discharge, she worked as a saleswoman at a clothing store. While she did think about modeling, she says, she never expected to be Miss Israel.
“I didn’t think about this direction at all. Looking at this world from the outside, there was a lot that didn’t look good. I thought that this wouldn’t be suitable for me, because I was an officer in the army and everything that comes with that, and when my friend came to my house and took me to the competition by force, that is how it started,” she recounts. “I came in, and this world was revealed to me. It looks very materialistic and terribly kitschy, but I can tell you that this isn’t correct.”
Her ascension to the position of Miss Israel became an international news story because of her skin color and because American President Barack Obama invited her to dine with him and President Shimon Peres during this week’s presidential visit.
Following her discussion of that invitation in an interview that ran in last week’s Post, journalists from around the world picked up the story.
At the time, she said she believed she had been invited to meet Obama because they are the first people of African heritage to attain their respective titles, she said, adding that she was “very excited” about the prospect of meeting a leader whose success she cited as a “notable influence on her life.” As a young immigrant, she said, she “never thought that such a thing could happen” to her.
The following morning, her story took on even bigger proportions when she said she would join the growing list of prominent Israelis fighting for American- Jewish spy Jonathan Pollard’s release from a US jail. She told Channel 2 that she planned on asking Obama directly to free the ailing Pollard.
THAT SENSE of responsibility and community service is a persistent theme during our interview, and makes sense given Aynaw’s military service.
Being Miss Israel “is giving me the opportunity to contribute, and it really seems to me that my work is very important,” she says. “I am now starting to get involved with community activities. I go to a lot of events by organizations that donate money to the Israel Defense Forces, and all sorts of things like that.”
She wants to use her position to help establish after-school programs for underprivileged youth, she says.
“This is my goal and what I want to do in this year.”
Now “under pressure” because of her packed schedule of interviews and photo shoots – “I am giving interviews to all sorts of places, even internationally,” she notes – she nonetheless asserts that this is not what she finds important.
“Generally it’s about giving to the community,” she says.
Another issue tightly connected to her victory in the beauty pageant is that of race. However, she says that while she wants to use her position to fight racism in Israeli society, she feels she must emphasize that she is “the representative of all Israelis. I go to the world as Miss Israel, and not as Miss Israel of the Ethiopians.”
When it comes to combating discrimination, she says she has “several ideas.”
Asked if her victory is a sign that Israelis are progressing beyond judging people based on race – an issue that has come up with previous waves of immigration – Aynaw concurs that this is one aspect of the win.
“I am very proud and I was always proud of this [being Ethiopian]. I was almost the only Ethiopian officer on my base,” she recalls, taking further pride in having trained the soldiers who guarded the Jerusalem checkpoint.
“I am very proud, and my community is very proud,” she continues. As she did during the Miss Israel competition, she cites slain American civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. as an inspiration.
“He fought for equality for blacks and whites, because there is no difference between people of flesh and blood, and I think that my victory is another side to that equality,” she says.
Regarding her lack of an accent, Aynaw says she can’t really explain it.
“Truthfully I don’t know. Many people ask me why I don’t have an accent. I just picked up the language.”
When she and her brother arrived in Netanya, she recalls, “we didn’t stay in an absorption center, we went to our grandparents’ house. And we didn’t go to ulpan, we went straight to a regular school, and when you are thrown into deep water, you have to learn to swim.”
Growing up in Ethiopia, she says, she never expected to end up representing Israel to the world.
“This wasn’t something that I ever dreamed of happening to me,” she says. “When I won, one of the images in my head was myself as a young girl in Ethiopia, and how I’ve merited to reach this height from nothing, and this picture ran through my head of where I am today and where I was.”
Of course, she continues, “that was only 10 or 11 years ago – that isn’t so much. It’s wonderful to see how far a person can come in 10 years – to move [to a new country], to get a diploma, to be an officer in the army. It’s wonderful. Everything is a matter of will.”
There is no doubt she is thrilled at her victory, all issues of race aside. Representing all Israelis at the Miss Universe competition, she says, feels like “a lot of responsibility.”
“It’s very exciting, and I really feel the merit and the honor of being Miss Israel. It’s fun. There is no question that it changes life 180 degrees, because I wake up in the morning and my schedule is as follows: Go to an interview on the radio, then television, then I go to an event. It’s pressure.”
Compounding the pressure is the fact that she does not speak English, though she is now beginning to learn.
Despite entering the world of pageants and beauty competitions, her idealism is still her driving force. She says she is planning to enroll in college in the fall and study either international relations or psychology, and although she has not yet chosen a school or a major, “international relations calls to me more.”
Wrapping up the interview, she expresses gratitude to Jews from France and the English-speaking countries for their contributions to the State of Israel and to the IDF, saying she would like to take the opportunity to “tell them thank you very much.”
Judging by the comments on the Post website, the thanks go both ways, and many in the Diaspora are grateful for an international representative who expresses such dedication to Zionist and Jewish values. ■
JTA contributed to this report.