Rona-Lee Shimon

Rona-Lee Shim'on was born in Ramat Gan, Israel, to a Ashkenazi-Jewish and Mizrahi Jewish family.

Her Jewish descent is Polish, Iraqi and Persian.

When she was 3 years old, she started taking ballet lessons. At age 12, she joined the Israeli dance troupe Bat Dor (בת דור). After graduating high school, she attended the Royal Ballet Academy in Amsterdam on a full scholarship. She then returned to Israel to dance professionally.^[1] Her sister, Sivan Noam Shim'on, is also an actress, who acted in 2015 Israeli drama film Blush. Her brother, Almog Shim'on, taught her how to shoot a gun for Fauda.

In 2005, Shim'on was a contestant on the Israeli version of So You Think You Can Dance, called Born to Dance (Hebrew: נולד לרקוד).^[2] In 2006, she made her acting debut, appearing in one episode of Our Song (השיר שלנו), a musical Israeli soap opera.

Shim'on went to theatre school for three years and performed in plays like Cabaret and Chicago, with her latest role as Anita in West Side Story.

She is known primarily for her leading role in Fauda. Her character, Nurit, is the only woman in the Israeli counter-terrorism unit formed almost exclusively of men.^[3] To perform that role, Shim'on did all the stunts herself as did the rest of the cast, and her training included how to fire a weapon, Krav Maga, and kickboxing.^[4]

In 2020, she appeared as Mika in Messiah.^[5] In 2025, she played Mossad agent Eliza in The Terminal List: Dark Wolf.