La'Isha (, literally "For the Woman") is an Israeli women's magazine published weekly in Hebrew by the Yedioth Ahronoth media group. Founded in January 1947 as a supplement to the group's newspaper, it became a separately sold magazine in July that year. Communication scholar Einat Lachover has described it as the country's most popular and longest-running privately owned commercial women's magazine.
The magazine combines service journalism on fashion, beauty, food, health, family life and consumer affairs with interviews, personal narratives and reporting on social issues. Researchers including Sonia Leiden, Moran Pollack and Einat Lachover have examined its changing representations of domesticity, paid employment and women's participation in public life, and the relationship between its commercial identity and its civic role.
Its public initiatives include the Miss Israel pageant, held under its auspices from 1950 to 2021, and projects addressing sexual and domestic violence. A permanent redesign displaying a domestic violence helpline on every issue's spine received international advertising awards in 2026. Karina Shtotland has been editor-in-chief since 2014.
History Foundation and early years The first issue appeared in January 1947 in Mandatory Palestine as Yedioth Ahronoth – La'Isha, a four-page weekly supplement sold with Yedioth Ahronoth. A retrospective published by the magazine in 2004 reported an initial print run of 200 copies and a price of 20 Palestine mils. The opening editorial promised practical information about household management, family budgets, nutrition, childcare, sewing, fashion, health and beauty, alongside discussion of women's participation in public and cultural life. On 23 July 1947, it became a separately sold publication, subtitled "a popular weekly for the home and family".
The founder and first editor-in-charge was lawyer Hemda Nofekh-Mozes, who remained associated with the magazine until her death in 1989. Her legal-advice column, Bisvakh Hamishpat ("In the Tangle of the Law"), addressed legal and social questions affecting readers. Day-to-day editing was initially undertaken by Aharon Shamir, who served until 1952, followed by David Karsik, who remained editor until 1979.
Early departments covered mothers and children, dressmaking patterns, beauty, children's health and cooking, together with interviews and personal stories. A retrospective published for the 4,000th issue also mentioned the features "Figure of the Week" and "These Women", a knitting column and children's photography contests. The advice column Tevat Do'ar ("Mailbox"), established in January 1947, offered confidential responses from a lawyer, educator, physician and experienced woman. Questions about children, relationships and sexuality helped establish the magazine as a source of personal guidance.
Historian Sharon Geva found that its 1950s coverage gave unusual prominence to individual women Holocaust survivors. Interviews and first-person accounts identified the women by name and included their photographs, treating the Holocaust as part of an individual biography rather than primarily as a political controversy or collective narrative. This approach nevertheless frequently framed survivors through motherhood, family life and victimhood.
Early statehood and social change
During Israel's early years, the magazine addressed everyday life under austerity, family, health, employment and consumption. It also promoted public initiatives associated with constructing an Israeli female identity, including Miss Israel, a national homemaker competition and the introduction of Mother's Day into Israeli public life. The first Miss Israel competition took place in 1950, following Nofekh-Mozes's initiative.
During the Six-Day War, La'Isha encouraged readers to contribute to the war effort. The delayed 1967 beauty pageant, ultimately held in Jerusalem, was presented as part of the celebration of victory.
In the early 1970s, it sympathetically covered poverty, housing shortages and discrimination against female factory workers, sometimes criticizing government policy. Although it did not cover the militant demonstrations of the Israeli Black Panthers, it supported their objectives and included women associated with the movement among its "women of the year"; the 1971 list was headed by "the Israeli woman struggling with economic hardship". Its coverage largely overlooked the protest's Mizrahi ethnic dimension. A later study contrasted this reporting with its much narrower coverage of the 2011 Israeli social justice protests.
Studies of the 1970s found that domesticity and motherhood remained dominant ideals, alongside emerging representations of independent and critical women. An analysis of articles published between 1967 and 1977 found that the magazine encouraged paid employment for women, including mothers, while presenting several competing understandings of women's work and the division of responsibilities within families.
From the 1980s onward Zvi Elgat succeeded Karsik in 1979 and edited the magazine until 1996. An obituary published by Ynet in 2008 stated that under his editorship the magazine reached unprecedented circulation and became the most widely distributed weekly in Israel. Coverage expanded to careers, education, relationships, health, consumer affairs, culture and leisure, while fashion, food and family remained central. A retrospective of milestone issues documented the combination of celebrity and entertainment coverage with articles about women in management, domestic violence and an illustrated self-defence course.
In August 1996, Iris Zohar-Pinhasi became the first woman to oversee the magazine's daily editing, serving until 1999. During her tenure, the relationship between advertising and editorial content attracted criticism. In 1997, the media journal The Seventh Eye criticized the integration of products and advertisers into articles; Zohar-Pinhasi and the magazine's marketing staff defended consumer information as a service sought by readers.
Orna Nenner became editor-in-chief in June 1999. She described her approach as combining enjoyable reading with practical information, investigative reporting and women's advancement. Personal features and articles about careers, relationships and the division of household work became more prominent. She also introduced the column "A Room of One's Own" and articles on the economic value of housework. The column Hamichtav Shelo Nichtav ("The Unwritten Letter"), which she had founded in the newspaper supplement Zmanim Moderniyim and brought to La'Isha in 1999, published genuine letters addressed to people with whom readers had left something unsaid.
Karina Shtotland, previously editor of Zmanim Moderniyim, became editor-in-chief in 2014. She expanded reporting on obstacles to women's participation and advancement, including violence, employment discrimination, prostitution, single parenthood and women's health. In 2021, she received the Sokolov Award for written journalism for this work.
For its 75th anniversary in 2022, the magazine launched a searchable online archive of nearly 4,000 covers dating from 1947, accompanied by articles about their history. Its 4,000th issue followed in 2023, with a retrospective tracing its development from a small publication focused on homemaking, thrift and grooming into a broader magazine covering personal stories, society, culture, health, sexuality, careers and fashion.
Content and editorial identity Service journalism and public affairs La'Isha combines interviews, features and personal narratives with recurring coverage of fashion, beauty, food, health, family life, relationships, travel, culture and consumer affairs. Scholars have described its editorial identity as containing competing ideas about femininity: domestic and family responsibilities appear alongside women's economic independence and participation in public life.
Einat Lachover's research on social protest identified the personal story as a means of connecting readers to wider political and economic questions. In the early 1970s, accounts of families experiencing poverty, housing campaigns and factory workers included discussion of pay discrimination, promotion and trade-union representation. Her comparison with the 2011 Israeli social justice protests found a more restricted civic role in the later coverage. A separate study of the 2011 protests reported that the magazine sent six of its writers to protest encampments and streets, publishing their personal columns in its issue of 8 August 2011; the study found that coverage was confined to that issue and centred on the writers' personal experiences, and concluded that commercial women's magazines offered only limited political discussion.
Changing representations of women Early departments focused on motherhood, childcare, beauty, sewing patterns and cooking. This domestic emphasis coexisted with profiles of working and public women and discussion of rights in legal advice and readers' letters. Moran Pollack's analysis of issues from 1970, 1973, 1977 and 1980 found continued emphasis on family and appearance, but increasing coverage of women entering occupations conventionally associated with men, unequal pay and hiring discrimination. A 1977 feature about single Israeli women aged 25–35 discussed personal freedom, cohabitation and relationships without treating marriage as an immediate goal. More independent representations nevertheless coexisted with stereotypes centred on women's appearance.
A study of the magazine's discussion of paid employment in 1967–1977 identified elements of both liberal and socialist feminism. It found that La'Isha encouraged women, including mothers, to enter paid work and addressed gender and class inequality, while continuing to assign women primary responsibility for the home and children.
Social-group representation has also been studied. Yulia Shevchenko and Lachover analysed a March 2020 special issue about women who immigrated from the former Soviet Union as children or adolescents, often described as the “1.5 generation”. They identified discourses of nationality, Russianness, becoming Israeli and immigrant success, interpreting the issue as combining neoliberal feminism with a traditional gender and ethnonational order. Their findings concerned this particular issue rather than the magazine's entire coverage of post-Soviet immigrants.
Lachover's study of coverage during the first year of the Gaza war examined 51 issues, 489 feature articles and more than 1,000 shorter departmental items. It found that the magazine integrated stories of war and bereavement into lifestyle coverage, discussed the gradual return to everyday subjects with its readers, and adopted patriotic framing that emphasised resilience and women's military participation. Lachover argued that this public role was accompanied by limited institutional criticism and a retreat from the magazine's earlier feminist perspective.
Relationships, sexuality and readers' letters Readers' letters and advice columns established a continuing exchange between the audience and the editorial staff. The 1947 Teivat Do'ar (“Mailbox”) column invited women to share personal problems and promised confidentiality. Its successors discussed family life, adolescents and intimate relationships. Later columns included “This Is My Problem”, “Stories from Life” and “The Unwritten Letter”, combining practical advice with first-person accounts.