Founder and President (Lt. Col., Res., IDF)
Lt. Col. (Res.) Sarit Zehavi is the Founder and President of the Alma Research and Education Center, an independent Israeli nonprofit she established to make in-depth knowledge of Israel’s security challenges accessible to English-speaking audiences. Based in communities along Israel’s northern border, Alma specializes in the threats from Hezbollah and Iran’s network in Lebanon and Syria, giving its analysts a firsthand vantage on the front they study.
Before founding Alma, Zehavi served roughly fifteen years in the Israel Defense Forces, specializing in military intelligence, with work centered on research and analysis tied to the Northern Command. She holds an M.A. in Middle East Studies from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. Through Alma she has built a body of field briefings, written analysis, and public commentary on Hezbollah’s force structure, the role of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, and conditions along the Israel-Lebanon and Israel-Syria borders, and she conducts briefings at lookout posts on the northern border for visiting delegations, lawmakers, journalists, and diplomats.
Zehavi has held in-depth briefings in Washington, D.C. with United States senators and representatives on security developments in Lebanon and Syria, and is recognized internationally as an authority on the security issues facing Israel. She was named by the Jerusalem Post among its Top 50 Most Influential Jews of 2021. She lives with her family in Kfar Vradim, in Israel’s Western Galilee.
