Yael (name)

Yael (יָעֵל, ; also spelled Jael) is a female given name of Hebrew origin. It is the name of biblical figure Jael, who saved the Israelites by killing Sisera, commander of the Canaanite king Jabin's army, by hammering a tent peg through his temple while asleep in her tent. The word yael means "Nubian ibex" (Capra nubiana), from a verbal phrase meaning "he goes up".

In France, Yael or Yaël has been recorded was a somewhat rare feminine given name given in the 1970s and 1980s; it has since re-surfaced as a masculine given name ranked between 494th and 249th in popularity in France during 2000 to 2021.

People with the given name

 * Yael Abecassis (b. 1967), Israeli actress and model
 * Yael Arad (b. 1967), Israeli Olympic-medalist judoka
 * Yael Averbuch (b. 1986), American soccer player
 * Yael Bartana (b. 1970), Israeli video artist
 * Yael Bitrán (b. 1965), Chilean-born naturalized Mexican historian, translator, and musicologist
 * Yael Braudo-Bahat, Israeli peace activist
 * Yael Cohen (b. 1986), founder and CEO of Fuck Cancer
 * Yael Dayan (b. 1939), Israeli writer and politician
 * Yael Eckstein, senior vice president of the [International Fellowship of Christians and Jews
 * Yael S. Feldman (b. 1941), Israeli-born American scholar
 * Yael German (b. 1947), Israeli politician
 * Yael Globerman (b. 1954), Israeli poet, writer, and translator
 * Yael Goldman (b. 1978), Israeli actress, TV host, and model
 * Yael Grobglas (b. 1984), Israeli actress
 * Yaël Hassan (b. 1952), French-Israeli writer
 * Yael Tauman Kalai, Israeli-American cryptographer
 * Yael Kanarek (b. 1967), Israeli-American artist
 * Yael Kraus (b. 1977), Israeli singer/songwriter
 * Yael Lempert (b. 1973/4), American diplomat
 * Yael Goldstein Love (b. 1978), American novelist, editor, and book critic
 * Yael Markovich (b. 1984), Israeli-American model and Israeli beauty queen titleholder
 * Yael Meyer (b. 1981), Chilean singer, songwriter, musician, and producer
 * Yael Naim (b. 1978), French-Israeli singer/songwriter
 * Yaël Braun-Pivet (b. 1970), French lawyer and politician
 * Yael Rom née Finkelstein (1932–2006), one of the first female pilots of the Israeli Air Force
 * Jael Ruesch (née Ashton), known as Jael (1937–2000), American fantasy artist/illustrator
 * Yael Stone (b. 1985), Australian actress
 * Jael Strauss (d. 2018), contestant on America's Next Top Model, season 8
 * Yael Tal (b. 1983), Israeli actress
 * Yael Tamir (b. 1954), Israeli academic and politician
 * Yael Yuzon (b. 1983), Filipino vocalist and guitarist
 * Yael Bar Zohar (b. 1980), Israeli actress, model, and television host

Middle name

 * Jenifer Bartoli (Jenifer Yaël Dadouche-Bartoli), French pop singer
 * Daniela Yael Krukower, Israeli-Argentinean judoka world champion

Pseudonym

 * Jaël, stage name of Rahel Krebs, Swiss singer/songwriter
 * Ivanka Trump took the Hebrew name Yael after converting to Judaism

Fictional characters

 * Yael, a woman in ancient Israel who escapes the massacre at Masada, in Alice Hoffman's novel The Dovekeepers (2011)
 * Yael Aronov, in John Sanford's novel Storm Front (2013)
 * Yael "Yaeli" Ashkenazi, in the Netflix Original series When Heroes Fly
 * Yael Baron, in the Netflix Original series Degrassi: Next Class
 * Yael Hoffman, in the TV series Weeds
 * Alice Jael Reasoner, also known as Jael, an assassin in Joanna Russ' novel The Female Man (1975)
 * Yael from "Return to Me" by Lynn Austin