From the first Israeli government until the 12th, Golda Meir was the only woman in the Israeli government (though not the parliament). Golda Meir, who started out as a secretary of the Women's Labour Council of Histadrut, and later became the head of the Jewish Agency for Israel's political department, and then an ambassador to the Soviet Union, came back to Israel in 1949 after she was elected to the Knesset, and served as the Israeli Minister of Labor. She held this job for 7 years under a number of Prime Ministers, until in 1956 she became Foreign Minister, a job she held for 10 years until 1966.