Golda Meir was the Prime Minister of
Israel from 1969 to 1974. She was
Israel's first woman prime minister and the third woman to be leader of a country in the 20th century. Trained as a teacher in the
United States, she moved to
Palestine in the 1920s and then to Israel. She had a long career in the
Knesset, Israel's legislature, holding Minister of Labor and Minister of Foreign Affairs positions.
[Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Golda Meir] Meir was a leader of the
Zionist movement, which is a pro-Jewish movement that supported the founding of a
Jewish state.
[IHT: Zionism (February 4, 2005)] In
1956, she changed her last name from Meyerson to Meir, which means "to burn brightly," to emphasize her Jewish roots.
[Jewish Virtual Library: Golda Meir]