You may not have heard of “Captain Ella,” but Israeli Lieutenant Colonel Ella Waweya is pretty well-known in the Arab world—in Israel and beyond.

That’s because Ms. Waweya, an Israeli Muslim, recently became the Israel Defense Forces’ Arabic-language spokesperson, succeeding Colonel Avichay Adraee. In that role, and in uniform, Captain Ella has appeared in many social media videos, presenting an image that has stunned some, infuriated some and elated others.

One such video shows her walking down a street in Tulkarm, in Shomron, “Area B,” greeting viewers in Arabic with a smile and a friendly “Ya ahali, Tulkarm!”—“Hi, Tulkarm folks!”—as young Arabs look on in some puzzlement.

Another armed soldier accompanied her as she held a microphone.

Her message there was economic. She explained how she hears from many fellow Arabs in Yehudah and Shomron how they want only to be able to feed their families and make ends meet.

“But,” she says softly but firmly, “there are people who would steal those dreams from you, pull your young people and children to the way of arms and turn these alleys into battle sites.”

“In the end,” she continues, “you and your children are paying the price. Don’t let terrorism steal your lives away, and don’t let anybody hide among you.”

That video garnered more than 800,000 views on one social medium. Her combined videos, across several media, have been seen by millions. And she has half a million social media followers.

Needless to say, there have been negative reactions to Captain Ella. It is criticism, though, born of hatred: the same Arab currency that necessitated the accompanying soldier in Tulkarm—and fear, that she might actually be convincing Arab Muslims about reality.
In fact, it’s undeniable that she made a positive impression on some, perhaps many. She has received private messages from Arabs frustrated by the terrorists who act in their name. But few would dare express the fact publicly.

Captain Ella hails from the Arab Israeli town of Kalansuwa, where all the citizens are Muslim Arabs. She originally kept her enlistment in the IDF secret from her family, but her mother came to feel pride in her daughter’s accomplishments.

“Ten years later,” Ms. Waweya said in 2024, “there are now ten soldiers from Kalansuwa [in the IDF], and I believe I’m allowed to take credit for that. I come home in my uniform, and people ask questions about the army. Those who want to join, I accompany from A to Z.”
The new Arabic spokesperson has served in the IDF for more than a decade. Before her recent promotion, she was a deputy spokesperson.

In 2004, a presenter for a Russian Arabic-language outlet quoted a survey to her about how Gazans think that Hamas won.

She answered: “Of course they have won—in destroying the future of Gazans, the schools, the mosques, the hospitals. If this is victory, then ahlan wa sahlan (“kol hakavod”—very loosely translated). So you want to tell me that they have won? It will take them years to rebuild the infrastructure in Gaza. Here [in Israel], things are reblooming. Yes, [Hamas] murdered and destroyed, but we can look back, learn our lessons, embrace each other, and move forward.”

At the onset of the current conflict, Ms. Waweya used social media to post a caricature of Iran’s blessedly late leader Ali Khamenei, depicted as a bloodied octopus, with an Arabic caption reading “The arms that extended to sabotage capitals and countries and threaten the proud people of Israel were cut off one by one, until the head of the octopus of terrorism paid the price for its evil and criminality in its own backyard.”

It’s easy—and, unfortunately, justifiable—to be pessimistic about the likelihood that Arab and Muslim antipathy toward Israel will change anytime soon. Hatred is still being relentlessly inculcated in too many young Arab minds.

But incurable optimists can point to the increased number of Arabs working at Israeli government agencies and in law enforcement. And can hope that Captain Ella, as a Muslim woman speaking in Arabic, her first language, to millions of fellow Arabs and Muslims, might open a crack in the wall of anti-Israel hostility, and that the crack will, as time progresses, widen further.

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