Professional Affiliation

Non-Resident Senior Fellow, Atlantic Council 

Expert Bio

Ksenia Svetlova serves as a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council. Prior to that, she was a Research Fellow at the Institute for Policy and Strategy IDC Herzliya and has served as a Knesset member. She has been a member of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee as well as Aliya and Integration committee at the Knesset and a chair of three parliamentary lobbies: “Women for peace and security”, “Freedom of press and expression” and “Israel-Kurdish alliance.”

Prior to her election to the Knesset, Ksenia Svetlova has served as senior analyst and reporter on Arab affairs on Channel 9 (Israel). She had covered the war in Iraq while on a U.S. assault ship in the Persian Gulf, conducted exclusive interviews in Lebanon, Syria, Libya, Gaza, and West Bank during the second Palestinian Intifada, and reported on the Arab springs dramatic developments from Tahrir square. Svetlova is a contributor to the Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel, Al-Monitor and Newsweek.  She is now a PhD student at Bar-Ilan University, working on a thesis "The coverage of Israel by Egyptian press 1981-2011". She is fluent in four languages: Hebrew, Russian, English, and Arabic. Her recent book “Through Middle East on heels” (Pardes) analyzes the profound changes that took place in the Arab countries during the last two decades.