As a Knesset freshman 13 years ago, Meretz Party leader Zahava Gal-On helped expose a case of "indecent acts" by former transportation minister Yitzhak Mordechai, of which he was consequently convicted.

At that time, before the age of social media, journalists would not report suspicions of sexual harassment by public figures unless an official police complaint was filed. Until then, senior military officers and prominent politicians took the liberty of harassing without disturbance. This was especially true when it came to someone with an impressive military career like Mordechai, nicknamed the "general of three fronts,” who had won several awards for his military service.

Gal-On refused to be intimidated and decided to confront him and to help one of the women he harassed, a political activist, file a police report, bursting the Mordechai affair into the open. He was subsequently found guilty of sexual harassment, a conviction which disrupted his political career and led to his divorce.

Since that achievement, Gal-On has been at the forefront of  parliamentary efforts to combat sexual harassment. Women turn to her when they’re targeted, but she’s also become the butt of criticism, mostly by men who claim that her feminist activism stems from a “rabid hatred of men” and a desire for fame. She was also prominent in the public campaign against former president Moshe Katsav, which led to his conviction of rape and sexual assault and being thrown in jail.