Refaeli is considered among the most internationally successful models to come from Israel, alongside models such as Nina Brosh and Michaela Bercu.
As a result of her modelling and investment career, her net worth was estimated at US $20 million in 2015. According to Israel, she was the highest-paid model in Israel in 2013, ahead of the combined modeling income of other Israeli models such as Esti Ginzburg,Gal Gadot, and Shlomit Malka.[14]
She was the cover model of the 2009 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, and was voted No. 1 on magazine's Hot 100 list of 2012. As a television host, Refaeli has hosted of The X Factor Israelsince 2013 and co-hosted the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 in Tel Aviv.
Refaeli was born and raised in Hod HaSharon,Israel, to a secular Jewish family. In Hebrew, her first name means "wild" (as in nature), and her surname literally means "God heals" and is a derivative of the biblical angel Raphael. Her parents were bothborn in Israel, and her grandparents wereimmigrantsfrom Europe and of Sephardic Jewish(Italian-Jewish) and Ashkenazi Jewish(Lithuanian-Jewish, and Polish-Jewish) descent. Her grandparents were Holocaust survivors. Her mother was a successful model in the 1970s under her maiden name, Tzipora "Tzipi" Levine.