The Inspiring Journey of a Doctor Who Defied the Odds

A recent post on social media has resonated widely, and rightfully so.

Posted by 36-year-old Hadass, a doctor who recently completed her service as a military doctor in the Air Force with the rank of Captain. "My name is Hadass. I'm 36, a doctor, and a graduate of the Faculty of Medicine at Ben-Gurion University. I served in the Air Force as a doctor for five years. I was discharged as a Captain and continue to volunteer in the reserves to this day," she introduces herself in writing.

She lives in a mixed kibbutz where religious and secular people coexist, is married to an architect named Yonatan, and is a mother to four children: Tamar (8), Hillel (6.5), Noga (3), and Avigail (10 months old). Hadass wrote this post, among others, to share her personal story and encourage children from peripheral and disadvantaged neighborhoods, or places with high Ethiopian immigrant populations, to aim for higher education, she says.

The post, shared by Shalom Peretz, the manager of the Facebook group 'Beautiful Israelis', received thousands of likes, comments, and shares, thanks in part to Hadass's unique achievements. "I immigrated to Israel at the age of four from Ethiopia, via Sudan. My children have an Ethiopian grandfather who was a prisoner of Zion, tortured significantly due to his Zionist activities, and an Egyptian-Syrian grandfather who was a Mossad agent who contributed greatly to bringing Ethiopian Jews to Israel.

"They have an Ethiopian grandmother who, with incredible courage and determination, trekked through the threatening desert for an entire month with her five young children and suffered in a Sudanese refugee camp for ten months. She almost lost two of her children (including me) with one goal in mind - fulfilling the dream of Jerusalem. This grandmother raised 11 children in Israel, teaching them to face the challenges of adjusting to a new country.

"My children also have a Polish grandmother whose parents escaped the Holocaust in Poland and reached Israel when she was just a year old. The wonderful family she established in Israel is the best testament to our victory as the Jewish people over racial and anti-Semitic enemies. Our home, though materially and economically modest, was rich in values and spirit. We were educated with values of love for the country, defending the homeland, which is our one and only land, and that Jews have no other place in the world. We were raised with values of giving, mutual help, love for others, respect, and the pursuit of excellence and success. As a child, I did not see obstacles in my path. I felt fully Israeli, with my skin color as insignificant as anyone else's eye color or hair.

I Felt an Urgent Need to Make a Deep and Meaningful Change, But I Didn't Know What or How

At just three years old, she left home in Ethiopia with her mother, contracting severe illnesses like malaria and measles in the refugee camp they reached in Sudan. "No one believed I'd survive and reach Jerusalem. I suffered from severe malnutrition."

Once she finally arrived in Israel after the grueling journey, she was first admitted to Soroka Hospital in Be'er Sheva for lengthy rehabilitation. "During my first days in the Holy Land, while hospitalized, the dream of becoming a doctor when I grew up was conceived and solidified," she recounts. From then on, no matter what challenges she faced on the way to her life's dream, she overcame them with bravery. "In the neighborhood I grew up in, there was a high concentration of Ethiopians and not many success stories came out of it, unfortunately. Since the murder of Solomon Tekah, z"l, by a police officer, I have felt like I'm sleepwalking.

"I felt like I couldn't breathe, like there was no point in going to work. I felt an urgent need to do something to bring about deep and meaningful change, but I didn't know what or how. I looked for people who felt like me, hoping to share my feelings and helplessness with them. The reaction on social media seemed pointless to me. I saw the burst of anger and frustration that spontaneously organized and took to the streets. Teens cried out from the depths of their hearts. Mothers cried out from their aching wombs with the loss of yet another child. I pondered with myself endlessly. The thoughts never ceased. How do we stop this madness? How do we bring about real change? How do we explain to Israeli society, to the people I meet every day at work, in the kibbutz, in studies, and in other settings, what's happening to this community? What leads to such an outburst of anger and hatred that now also hurts innocent civilians in some cases."

Usually, she doesn't talk about racism. "My parents always said that prejudices are just background noise that shouldn't be listened to. We should focus on our goal and not let it bother us. When I think about what I've been through in my life, I realize that racism and prejudice don't just belong to Ethiopian teens in underprivileged neighborhoods or other marginalized populations. Racism crosses all layers of the population; it's part of Israeli society and exists in a structured and institutionalized way in governance. It doesn't matter if I'm a doctor or the last teen sitting and enjoying a beer in the neighborhood park. I, the doctor, the officer living in a kibbutz, married to a wonderful man who isn't Ethiopian, and a symbol of successful immigration absorption and social integration, experience racism almost daily.

"It started in my childhood when classmates or random people on the street called me 'Kushi', and school teachers insisted on changing my name to Hadass because 'Adisa' isn't Israeli and even dared to choose the alternative name for me. I left that school, but even at the new school, they insisted I change my name. I gave up. I couldn't keep switching schools endlessly."

"What's the Point of Dreaming? We Won't Achieve Anything Anyway"

Hadass continues, saying she always felt she needed to prove she was worthy of her place. Even at medical school, where "eyebrows were raised on the first day when I walked into class, people asked if I was sure I was in the right class. As a medical student, patients often refused to let me approach them or expressed concerns or always assumed I was the cleaner or support staff, even though I stood in line with my classmates, wearing the same white coat, stethoscope, and a clearly labeled name tag "Hadass Melde - Medical Student." This, despite her excelling in her studies.

"When I tried to rent an apartment as a student, landlords were always thrilled on the phone to have a medical student renting from them: serious, long studies, long-term lease, a great deal. Until they met me. 'But you don't have an accent on the phone' was the most common phrase I heard. "We had just closed a contract right before you arrived... too bad..." and more.

"When I arrived at the military clinic, every patient who came to me couldn't hide their astonished expression that I was Dr. Hadass Misrai. But I could accept that. After all, at the time, there weren't many Ethiopian doctors. But when a female soldier turned to the medic and said she refused to enter the smelly Ethiopian doctor, and when a Colonel who visited our base didn't want to be examined by me, I couldn't bear it any longer. The tears choked me, and the feeling of insult rose up. Needless to say, as time went on and patients realized my abilities as a doctor, both professionally and personally, they preferred to wait a few days for an appointment with me rather than be seen by another doctor."

Hadass addresses several unpleasant incidents she had with the establishment, including the police, and says, "Racism is omnipresent, and the police are merely a 'symptom' of a much broader and deeper problem that exists in our society. If there isn't education on values of tolerance, love for others, and acceptance of the other, both at home and within the education system from an early age, I don't see how the situation will genuinely change. Some of the stories I've shared here are unknown even to those closest to me. But today, I found it right to put them on paper and share them. I always tried not to put the focus there and see how I could change this reality. For a decade, I traveled across the country from north to south, voluntarily telling my personal story to encourage children from peripheral and disadvantaged neighborhoods or places with a high Ethiopian immigrant population to aspire for higher education. The most shocking and sad thing I encountered was the fact that most children in these places, when asked what their dreams were, basically said they had none... 'What's the point of dreaming? We won't achieve anything anyway.' And that always shook me. Because what is a child without a dream? It's not a child. And we, as a society, created this reality in certain areas and certain populations. Not just in the Ethiopian population.

"We have a social responsibility to fix this. Most of the teens you see on the news today, expressing their rage, are boys and girls who deeply hurt by the loss of the ability to dream, which was taken from them in childhood, and no one paid attention to it. I want to believe that in the country I love, the country I have no other, people genuinely want to repair the world, change history, and certainly not repeat it," she concludes.