Former Knesset member Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh met this week with the outgoing chairman of the Jewish Agency, Isaac Herzog, who is about to assume his new position as Israel’s next president. At the end of their meeting, they announced that Kamal-Mreeh had just been appointed to the position of Jewish Agency emissary to college campuses in the United States and to the Jewish community of Greater Washington. She will be working with the Jewish Federation there and with Jewish student organizations in campuses across the United States through Hillel International.

Kamal-Mreeh already made history by becoming the first Druze woman elected to the Knesset. Now she is about to become the first Druze long-term representative of the Jewish Agency. While there have been other non-Jewish representatives of the Jewish Agency overseas, they only served at Jewish summer camps for a few weeks at most. Kamal-Mreeh will serve for two years, with an option to extend her term.

As she bustled about with last-minute preparations, the former Knesset member wrote in a Facebook post, “I am proud and excited to be part of a process that is setting a new precedent, and in which a new voice will be heard — a different, important and much needed voice — over the next few years, mediating all the many aspects of the reality of Israel to Jewish and non-Jewish communities in North America.”

Kamal-Mreeh made a point of stressing her belief that her identity as a Druze woman will help her in her task, saying, “My unique identity as a woman from the Druze community will contribute significantly to my mission and lead to very meaningful work. Acting in the name of pluralism and diversity, we will take steps to bring people together, bridge differences and shine a light on all that we have in common, for the sake of our country and our future.”