TEL AVIV — When Talleen Abu Hanna was a boy in Nazareth, an Arab city in Israel, he gave up karate and took up ballet. As a teenager, he stole his mother’s makeup and his sister’s dresses. He and his buddies would change in gas stations outside town, then party at nearby gay clubs.

“They would see boys going in, and we would put on our eye shadow, our wigs and skirts and dresses, and walk out and say, ‘Hiiii,’ ” Ms. Abu Hanna, 21, said in a recent interview, drawing out the last word.

In her teenage days, she said, she favored a look she described as Arab kitsch — heavy eyeliner, blush and foundation, topped with a cheap wig. After returning home, she had to remember to bite off her fake nails and replace her sparkly iPhone covers with plain leather ones.

But it was at one of those parties, when she was 15 or so, that Ms. Abu Hanna met a woman who told her that she used to be a man. Laughing, Ms. Abu Hanna asked her friends what “that lady” was smoking. Her friends, laughing as well, explained gender reassignment surgery to her.