Ruth Halperin-Kaddari

Ruth Halperin-Kaddari was born in 1966

Ruth Halperin-Kaddari was born on 15 May 1966. She is the daughter of Menachem Zvi Kaddari, a linguist who served as rector of Bar-Ilan University, and Leah Kaddari.

She earned a law degree at Bar-Ilan University in 1989. She then received a master's degree in 1990 and a doctorate in 1993 from Yale Law School, with support from the Fulbright program. She did her legal internship with Aharon Barak, president of the Supreme Court.

She is a professor of law at Bar-Ilan University, where she teaches family law and feminist approaches to law. In 2001 she founded the Ruth and Emanuel Rackman Center for the Advancement of the Status of Women and has directed it since. The center drafted an electronic monitoring bill for violent partners that became law in 2023.

She was elected to the UN women's rights committee in 2006 and reelected in 2010 and 2014. She led the adoption of a 2013 recommendation on the economic effects of family breakup and an inquiry into abortion law in Northern Ireland.

After the October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks, she co-founded The Dinah Project to document sexual violence committed during the attacks. In December 2024 she received an honorary degree from Brandeis University.