Lazimi said on 16 June 2026 that she intended to become education minister. Yair Golan announced that the Democrats would demand the portfolio for her.
Who they are
Naama Lazimi is a Labour MK who reached national politics through the students’ union, the trade union movement and Haifa city council. She was born in Migdal HaEmek in 1986 to Avi, a school principal and a former deputy mayor of the town, and Eti, who ran a cosmetics business. She served as an officer at the Defence Ministry and reached the rank of captain in the Home Front Command reserves.
At the University of Haifa she took a bachelor’s degree in political science and a master’s in Jewish history and was elected deputy chair of the students’ association, and the social protest of 2011 drew her further into activism. For six years she volunteered with the Koach LaOvdim union, organising the Hot North workers’ dispute and twice winning a seat on its leadership. She was a parliamentary adviser to Shelly Yachimovich and founded Hazon, a centre for political training and conflict resolution, within Peace Now.
On Haifa city council she chaired the gender equality committee and the board of the city’s museums company, pressed the council to employ its cleaners directly rather than through agencies, and carried a decision to issue family certificates to unmarried partners regardless of sex. In the Knesset she passed nine laws in her first term, among them an amendment entitling workers with cancer or on dialysis to sick pay from the first day they miss work for treatment.
Positions and record
Labour: At a Knesset hearing on 1 May 2023, she backed a NIS 40 hourly minimum wage and agreements covering whole sectors to secure pay and employment conditions.
Housing: At a State Control Committee hearing on 14 January 2025, she defended restoring public-housing tenants’ right to buy their homes.
Education: On 16 June 2026, she called for public state education to regain priority, with liberal values and equal opportunity at its centre.
Work: At a Knesset hearing on 1 May 2023, she called for a right to disconnect from work and rules governing hybrid working.
Where they stand
Holds the party line on every issue.