Quick Info→
Age: 49 Years
Hometown: British Columbia
Wife: Rachel Lord
Some Lesser Known Facts About Dave Sharma
- Dave Sharma’s father was an Indian, and her mother belonged to Sydney.
- The family moved to Turramurra, Sydney, in 1979. His mother died of breast cancer when he was 12 years old. He was raised by his father.
A childhood picture of Dave Sharma with his mother and sisters
- Dave Sharma graduated high school in 1993 with the highest Tertiary Entrance Rank of 100.
- After attending Cambridge University, he switched his field of study from natural sciences to law in his second year and graduated with first-class honours in law.
- After completing his law studies, Dave Sharma returned to Sydney to study medicine at Sydney Medical School.
- After a year of studying medicine, he started working for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
- During this time, Dave Sharma earned a master’s degree in International Relations from Deakin University.
An old picture of Dave Sharma
- He began working for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in 1999, with roles in both Australia and overseas.
- From 2004 to 2006, Dave Sharma served as a legal adviser to Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer.
- He worked at the Australian Embassy in Washington from 2006 to 2009. After that, he worked at the Australian High Commission in Papua New Guinea, Port Moresby.
- Later, Dave Sharma served as a senior civilian adviser with the Peace Monitoring Group on Bougainville.
- He was the Australian Ambassador to Israel from 2013- 2017. He once appeared with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu at Mount Scopus.
Dave Sharma with then-Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu
- From 2010 to 2012, Dave Sharma led the International Division in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.
- He advised Prime Minister Julia Gillard during G-20 and East Asia summits.
- Dave Sharma was involved in key international events in Australia including the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in October 2011 and President Obama’s visit in November 2011.
- Between 2012 and 2013, he worked as the Assistant Secretary in charge of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s Africa Branch.
- In November 2012, Dave Sharma visited Abuja, Nigeria, for talks with the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the National Security Adviser, and officials from the Economic Community of West African States.
- On 16 May 2013, he was appointed ambassador to Israel by Foreign Affairs Minister Bob Carr. He replaced Andrea Faulkner. He presented his certifications to Israeli President Shimon Peres on 8 August 2013.
- In 2013, Dave Sharma and his wife, Rachel, visited Syrian civil war casualties at Ziv Medical Center in Zefat, Israel. This gesture made him the first international representative to do so.
- In May 2014, he met with Israeli Housing and Construction Minister Uri Ariel in occupied East Jerusalem. This caused a diplomatic issue, which led to a complaint from the chief Palestinian UN negotiator to Julie Bishop, the Australian Foreign Affairs Minister.
Dave Sharma with Uri Ariel, Israeli Housing and Construction Minister (2014)
- The complaint accused him of supporting illegal Israeli policies. Later, Australia rejected the complaint and stated that the meeting did not change its stance on Jerusalem and the need for direct negotiations.
- In April 2017, Julie Bishop announced that Chris Cannan would replace him as Ambassador to Israel. Cannan began his role on 19 June 2017.
- Dave Sharma was one of seven Liberal MPs in the 46th Parliament of Australia (2019-2022) with degrees from Oxbridge or Ivy League universities.
- In 2018, he was appointed as the chairman of Shekel Brainweigh Limited, an Israeli technology company. During this time, he assisted several other Israeli technology companies in entering the Australian market.
- After former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull resigned in August 2018, Dave Sharma was chosen as the Liberal Party candidate for the Wentworth by-election.
- He contested against 15 other candidates. The independent candidate Kerryn Phelps, a former City of Sydney Councillor and AMA President, was his main competitor. Phelps won the Wentworth by-election with 51.22% of the vote margin and defeated Sharma.
- Dave Sharma was re-selected as the Liberal candidate for Wentworth in the 2019 federal election and won the seat from Phelps with a vote margin of 51.31%.
Dave Sharma with Kerryn Phelps (middle)
- He is a member of the Moderate/Modern Liberal faction of the Liberal Party.
- In 2019, he criticized the Israeli court system for entertaining fraudulent mental health claims by an accused child sex abuse criminal, Malka Leifer. These claims delayed her deportation to Australia.
- In January 2020, former Labor MP Melissa Parke sued Dave Sharma for defamation over an April 2019 tweet in which he accused her of anti-Semitism and “trafficking in conspiracy theories.” The incident took after she withdrew from the 2019 federal election following the publicity of her comments about Israel and Palestine.
- In October 2020, the Federal Court rejected Parke’s defamation action against Sharma but ruled that Sharma’s earlier settlement offer should take effect, meaning each party would pay their costs. Following the ruling, Sharma repeated his comments on Parke and called the outcome “a victory for free speech.”
- In 2020, Dave Sharma and Labor MP Josh Burns started a movement in the House of Representatives for the immediate deportation of Malka Leifer, a child sex abuse criminal, from Israel. During this time, he was serving as Australia’s ambassador to Israel.
Dave Sharma and Josh Burns (first from left) while speaking in the Malka Leifer case
- He advocates for Australia to take stronger action on climate change. He suggests that the government should have tried to get the US to rejoin the Paris Agreement and opposed a government plan to fund coal power plants in 2020. He also opposed electric car mandates that he viewed as too authoritarian.
- In 2020, he mentioned that the travel ban during the COVID-19 pandemic limited personal freedoms. He also requested for the changes in the World Health Organization.
- On 26 October 2021, Prime Minister Morrison announced that Australia would commit to a net-zero emissions target by 2050. He publicly supported this target. He was one of the moderates in the Liberal Party pushing for this commitment.
- In 2021, he called for the demobilization of military equipment in Gaza but believed that the conflict would continue until Hamas stopped rocket attacks.
- Dave Sharma supports gay marriage. In 2021, he insisted that the Religious Discrimination Bill in Australia should not damage gay rights.
- On 10 February 2022, Dave Sharma voted for protections for transgender students in modifications to the Sex Discrimination Act, after three other Liberal MPs had already committed to supporting the amendment.
- In the 2022 federal election, he competed against independent candidate Allegra Spender, who was part of a notable political family.
Dave Sharma with Allegra Spender
- During the campaign, he made headlines when he removed the Liberal Party logo from his advertising and changed some of his materials’ colour scheme from traditional Liberal blue to teal and matched it with his opponent’s colour.
- Dave Sharma lost the election to Spender, who won with 54% of the two-party preferred vote.
- He was then selected by the Liberal Party to fill the Senate vacancy which was left by Marise Payne’s resignation.
- During the 2023 Senate pre-selection, he was one of ten candidates who defeated former Australian Capital Territory senator ‘Zed Seselja’ and former New South Wales state minister for transport ‘Andrew Constance.’
- He was appointed to the Senate in a joint sitting of the New South Wales parliament on 30 November 2023.
- Dave Sharma supports Australia engaging in “political warfare” against threats, including disinformation campaigns and election interference, using techniques similar to those used by Israel’s intelligence. He believes these measures are necessary due to other countries’ interference in Australia’s affairs.
- He often supports increased military spending and advises Australia to boost its military spending to more than 2% of its GDP.
- Dave Sharma often suggests Australia reserve more positions within UN agencies and criticises the influence of countries like China in the UN.
- He often suggests that the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade should invest more in online diplomacy in Australia.
