JERUSALEM — She grew up in Zionist royalty, the pedigreed daughter of a "fighting family." She was a spy with the Mossad, her purportedly daring field exploits still classified. Today, she is the face of the Israeli government, in a country where politics remain largely the purview of macho men, and where being tough often outranks being smart.
And some people think Tzipi Livni could become the first female prime minister in more than a generation.
Israel routinely recycles its mostly male politicians, whatever scandal or other difficulty might befall them. How else to explain the long up-and-down career of Ariel Sharon, or the current comeback of Ehud Barak, or the omnipresence of Benjamin Netanyahu? In that world, Livni is a fresh phenomenon. In just a few years, she has emerged from relative obscurity to become one of Israel's most important political figures.
Livni, the foreign minister and deputy prime minister, who turned 49 on Sunday, has defied many stereotypes.
The product of an archly Zionist family, Livni evolved into a proponent of coexistence with the Palestinians, relinquishing the idea of a Greater Israel and instead advocating side-by-side states. A onetime agent with Israel's storied spy agency, she now sits down with Arab leaders and speaks to Arab newspapers.
This combination of old ideals and contemporary pragmatism has earned Livni a respect among many Israelis, from the right and left, who see her as a leader who is honest and principled, if not always suave.
"Supporting a two-state solution goes with the values I was raised with -- the need to keep Israel a Jewish state and a democratic one," Livni said in an interview at the modern, limestone Foreign Ministry on the western edge of Jerusalem. "The need is to adapt the two-state solution in order to live in our homeland ... a Jewish homeland ... while giving the Palestinians a possibility to create their own homeland."
Livni is not a natural schmoozer like, say, Netanyahu; her English is not flawless and her Israeli accent remains thick. She often seems aloof.
But she wins praise, here and abroad, for a willingness to seek compromise -- a skill not always valued in Israeli politics -- and to work not necessarily in the spotlight. Yet none of this should be mistaken for meekness, say those who know her.
"She shows strength without being aggressive, more of a European-style politician," said one veteran Israeli analyst. "But she can also be behind the scenes with a knife in her teeth when she needs to be. She knows how to fight."
