Linor Shefer, an Israeli American reality TV star who was born in Ukraine, won Moscow’s first Miss Jewish Star beauty pageant on Oct. 20.
The former contender on the Israeli version of “Big Brother” bested 19 other contestants, according to the STMEGI association of Mountain Jews.
A panel of four judges that included Dorit Golender, Israel’s ambassador to Russia, chose the winner and two runners-up.
The pageant was sponsored by more than a dozen companies and groups, including the Russian branch of the Hillel Jewish network, and was open to any unmarried woman under the age of 30 who is Jewish according to halachah, Jewish religious law.
Shefer, 29, moved with her family to Karmiel in northern Israel at age 5 from the city of Berdychiv in northern Ukraine. She moved to Los Angeles in 2006 to work in show business before returning to Israel to be with her family. — jta