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Just a few years ago, Yahya Mohamid was living in a northern Israeli town controlled by the Islamic movement and like everyone else in Umm el-Fahm, had been indoctrinated to hate Israel.

Today, the 20-year-old, calling himself a Muslim Zionist, has made his home in Jerusalem and is dedicated to getting the truth out about his life as an Arab Israeli and giving back to his country.

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He hopes to join the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in March and get into one of the elite combat units — a precedent for an Arab Israeli.

But Mohamid’s pro-Israel activism has come at a huge price.

The brave, articulate, handsome man — who seems wise beyond his years — has been subject to assaults, more death threats than he can count and has been forced to break ties with his mother and sister, both of whom still live in Umm el-Fahm.

“They live in a constant situation of fear,” he says.

Mohamid — in Canada this week on behalf of the StandWithUs advocacy organization to speak to audiences in synagogues, high schools and at university campuses — told me over coffee that growing up in his town was like living in an “isolated bubble world.”