BICOM

Rose Fostanes, a 47-year-old caregiver from the Philippines was this week voted by the public as the winner of Israel’s hugely popular inaugural season of the X-Factor reality contest.

Fostanes, who is just 4ft 11in tall has lived in Israel for six years and cares for an ailing woman in her 50s. She is one of an estimated community of at least 20,000 Filipinas in Israel who work overwhelmingly as caregivers, housekeepers and cleaners. Like many others, Fostanes lives in a crowded apartment in south Tel Aviv and saves money to send back to her family and her partner in the Philippines.

Fostanes’ story and her talent captured the hearts of Israelis who voted her the country’s first X-Factor winner on Tuesday night. The show’s producers flew her sister and partner to Israel especially for the final which was also attended by the Philippines Ambassador to Israel. In an interview with AP, Fostanes commented “I think everybody in Israel knows my name. And it is very funny.” She told Reuters that in the programme’s early episodes, “I feel that everybody is looking at me like I was an alien… A Filipina working here, cleaning houses,” but that now “I get from them love, from all the Israeli people who saw my videos and saw me on the television.”

According to the Guardian, a spokesman for the Philippines president, Benigno Aquino commented, “We know the situation she was in and we are very proud that she has again given the Philippines pride in the showcase of her talent.”

Fostanes’ victory was the latest in a series of successes on Israeli reality TV for members of minority communities. In August, Ethiopian-born Tahunia Rubel was crowned as the winner of Israel’s Big Brother. Earlier last year, German-born Catholic convert to Judaism Tom Franz won Israel’s Master Chef. The other two finalists on the reality cooking show were Salma Fiomy-Farij, a hijab-wearing Arab citizen, and Jacki Azulay, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish woman.