Ruth Dayan was an Israeli social activist who was the founder of the Maskit fashion house. She was also the first wife of Israeli Foreign Minister and General, Moshe Dayan (1915–1981). Active in many social causes, Dayan was a recipient of the Israeli President's Medal of Distinction, the Solomon Bublick Award, and the Yigal Allon Prize, in recognition of her social empowerment efforts.

Moshe Dayan was an Israeli military leader and politician. As commander of the Jerusalem front in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces (1953–1958) during the 1956 Suez Crisis, and especially as Defense Minister during the Six-Day War in 1967, he became a worldwide fighting symbol of the new state of Israel.