World’s 1st female rabbi led a 16th century Mosul yeshiva for Kurdish Jewry – Journalist and novelist Sigal Samuel honors her Iraqi Jewish heritage with picture book about Osnat Barazani, whose life was a real-life early Yentel story set in the Middle East | Timesofisrael

1 2 3 4 5As she grew up, Sigal Samuel secretly dreamed of becoming a rabbi. Instead, she became a journalist and author.
“My family is Iraqi on my father’s side, my mother’s family is Moroccan, and I grew up in Montreal’s Orthodox Jewish community. I just couldn’t imagine becoming a rabbi as an option,” Samuel said.