My right to exist 🇮🇱

Jewish diplomat and economist Rebeca Grynspan, former Vice President of Costa Rica, is leading the race to replace current UN Secretary-General António Guterres, whose term will end at the close of this year. According to Reuters, the 70-year-old Grynspan received 12 votes in favor and only 3 against in the eighth closed-door straw poll held by the UN Security Council this week. Grynspan currently leads the race, having won seven of the eight informal votes held in recent months. If elected, she would make history twice, becoming both the first woman and the first Jewish person ever to lead the international organization. Grynspan comes from a family of Holocaust survivors who fled Poland and has deep personal ties to Israel. She previously studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, her sister lives in Israel, and her nephews have served as combat soldiers in the IDF. Following the October 7 attacks, she publicly and unequivocally condemned Hamas’s atrocities and called for the release of the hostages, while maintaining close relationships and working with several Jewish organizations. Rebeca Grynspan, a Costa Rican Jew, emerged on July 30 as the early frontrunner in the first informal UN Security Council poll to select the world body’s next secretary-general. A former vice president of Costa Rica, Grynspan received 10 “encourage” votes from the council’s 15 members, one more than her nearest rival. The poll was nonbinding and more rounds are expected, but if Grynspan ultimately prevails, she would become both the first woman and the first Jew to lead the United Nations. Her candidacy casts an intriguing light on the history of the Central American nation’s tiny Jewish community. Grynspan’s parents were Polish Jews who fled Poland before World War II. After surviving the war, they attempted to reach the Land of Israel but were detained by the British in Cyprus. They met there and married, later settling in Costa Rica. The family initially ran a small store in the countryside before moving to the capital of San José, where Grynspan’s parents established a textile factory.