Golda MeirA balanced biography of Golda Meir, who was both adored and abhorred, from award winning author Deborah E. Lipstadt Golda Meir (18981978) was the first and only woman to serve as prime minister of Israel. She was born in Kiev into a childhood of poverty, hunger, and antisemitism. When she was five, her father left to find work in America, and a year later the family settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. As a teenager she became devoted to Labor Zionism,