Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book Discussion On The War On Women In Israel 20150221

[inaudible conversations] good evening. I am gabriel sanders, director of Public Programs at the museum and i welcome you to this evenings discussion on on women in israel a story of religious radicalism and the women fighting for freedom with Nancy Kaufman and Elana Maryles Sztokman. I would like to ask you to silence your cellphones. Cspan is here to film tonight ended your phone should rink it will be recorded for all of america to see. Is my pleasure to say that the museums Public Programs are made possible through a generous gift for mrs. Lillie saffron. Programs come about for all sorts of reasons. Some commemorate anniversaries. Others holidays. The impetus behind tonights program was something more pedestrian and more profound an airplane seat. Elana maryles sztokman was on a plane when an orphaned orthodox passenger delayed takeoff because he would not sit next to her. The experience was especially jarring as she had just done a toward discussing the place of when and in Israeli Society. It focused on questions like who gets to sit where in israel today both literally and figuratively speaking and who has the power to make those decisions. The story of Elana Maryles Sztokmans for deals are recorded in her blog and the online magazine tablet, became a sensation. It went viral. It cast a light on the sex isnt that is in many ways at the heart of israeli public life. We are delighted to have Elana Maryles Sztokman here with us today. He just flew in from israel. We hope her trip was without incident. Elana maryles sztokman is author of several books on feminism in jewish life including a educating in the divine image, gender issues in Orthodox Jewish schools which last year won a National Jewish but council toward in education. She will be joined on stage by Nancy Kaufman, ceo of the National Council of jewish women. Prior to joining, she served as executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of boston. Please join me in welcoming them to the stage. [applause] thank you to the museum of jewish heritage for hosting this very very important conversation and thanks to all of you who come out in the cold weather of new york to be here. This is very exciting for me because i first met Elana Maryles Sztokman as executive director of the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance and we work our ears in terms of some of the issues we both cared about and 120yearold organization. We are up progress of Jewish Organization that organizes graduates back to take a stand on issues of universal concern in the United States and israel. It is the pleasure to be here with you and to serve on this panel. Let me begin at the beginning in terms of israel. Not exactly the beginning that the beginning of the modern state of israel and remind everybody gathered of that very beautiful declaration of independence in 1948 that we so happily and proudly endorsed at the United States, at the u. N. And the very important line in that declaration of independence, quote the state of israel will ensure complete equality of social and political life to all its inhabitants perspective of religion, race or sex. I begin with that because i am proud as an american jew that israel did something the United States has never done which is to recognize that sex, equality of sex was as important as the quality of race or religion. That is the good news. The bad news is that sadly the Founding Fathers didnt quite understand what was going to happen as a result of the lack of separation of religion and state and subsequent events that have happened since then. I want to ask Elana Maryles Sztokman who has written this wonderful book, you can get it tonight after this program and it is quite a wonderful coming together of the issues we worked on for many many years since before the founding of the state and we will talk more about that with the sort of overarching theme and content i would say i assume it is your intent and i will ask you that, helping to ensure the israeli nation holds the progressive, moral and social vision for which was established. You say that in your introduction. Talk to us about why this book, why now and i want to talk about some of the challenges and opportunities in the modern jewish state that is provided and performing. First of all i want to say before i answer your question, a lot of places in israel where the activism has been crucial especially on the issues that i talk about in my book so i just want to acknowledge that and say thank you for all you continue to do. Why this book and why now . I have been living in israel for over 20 years and we believe in it. We believe in the importance of the jewish state and ultimately we want to see the jewish state fulfil its mission for being a state founded on a particular morality. It was founded or to be a refuge for Vulnerable People and so that should release kilby. That is a Jewish Mission also. When you see the state of israel not living up to that mission especially when it comes to women and you fit into that category theres something very painful about that. It comes from a belief that israel can do better and should do better. Interesting you start with the declaration of independence which does mention sex as something we need to aspire to and in the 50s israel was ahead of the United States a lot of issues, there were a lot of women expected to work and even some laws to protect women at work, to protect pregnant women, mothers, Something Back then said women have to be allowed to pick up their children and things like that. So women were expected to work and there are images of women at keyboards and in some ways is real was ahead of certain parameters but within all of that we have the contradictions. For example does it spend these images . We all are familiar with all of those who grew up and the power of that image, we are still waiting to have a woman president of the United States, woman Prime Minister and have laws in place before we had a Womans Movement in the United States so you have a wellintentioned democracy at the get go, perhaps a little fraud. Let me ask you this, what happened along the way . Why is it that the feminist movement of the 1960s didnt happen until much later . And those contradictions where they were real or not real. The israeli feminist movement didnt really take off and the 16s and 70s the way it did in america and that has to do with the survivalist mentality, fighting for your very existence though only thing that mattered, can deal with social issues. Not just a gender issue, or other social issues of racism ethnicity ethnic strife all of those social issues. And things like that. Meanwhile what you had is a society developing very much around that culture, the army culture one of the most chauvinistic institutions in israel. The army has to do a lot in the last decade to remedy that but at the end of the day there were a lot of chauvinistic attitudes that are taking place, and women serve in the military. 93 , can technically be held by them. And the great social equalizer for men and women. What is wrong with this picture . The want to plug on that for a second . In the army. The mandatory conscription for women in israel israel is the only country in the world that has mandatory conscription for women. When i directed to different jobs, administrative jobs, and the one that lead to better jobs and better positions in society. And0 this young guy with a black hat he gets up to me and he says you know he goes it down because he saw i was a young mother with a baby on my shoulder and as soon as he gets up the guy next to him this older guy must have been in the 60s and he goes like that, like no. [laughter] so this poor kid. Hes like 23 years old and he looks at me and he looks at the guy next to him and he looks at me and he looks at the guy and he is like and he is like what am i going to do and he sits back down. I go and find a seat in the back but that wasnt my first experience. I didnt know that exists than the truth as it wasnt official. It was a sacred segregated bus but it was not official segregated bus. I think back back on a moment and it was a moment of cultural transition meaning the guys the young mans ambivalence represented a shift within his own culture. He was in this place where he thought it was okay for a woman to sit there but the rules around him are changing. The experience we had was that the women, some of the women where we sat in the front came from the back of the bus and sat down and asked us in hebrew what we were doing and why. They themselves were wondering whats going on. The men, some of them put up their hats and they came on the bus and refuse to sit down next to us. Its not unusual for women to be gatekeepers of the pager gate. Its the Phyllis Schlaflys of the world. There are places where women take the roll up we are going to preserve the gender role. There are women for which the gender inequality we have is comfortable and safe in what is known to them. It could be scary and threatening for whatever reason so sometimes the women are even more vehement and oh no we cant make change. One of the contradictions here of course is good news i think which is the Supreme Court of israel which is one of the most liberal in the world and has this unusual thing that you can petition directly as a citizen the Supreme Court actually took this case up and ordered the buses not only their fate could not segregate that they were supposed to put up signs. When we came to town it was right after that. There were no signs up. There were no signs up saying you couldnt do this. The bus drivers were ignoring and they were still segregated. So what is the contradiction and what happens . You know that ncjw played a huge role. The freedom rides played a huge role especially Public Awareness and especially in collecting data. That is when the police started collecting data on what was really going on on the buses and they found a third of all buses there were some kind of bullying going on which was really important because everybody was like its not real everything is fine and it wasnt fine. The Supreme Court made a ruling that there has to be a bus line that says you cant anybody but the reality the facts on the ground do not match what the Supreme Court said which represents the governments ambivalence about it, transport ministry sort of ambivalence about all this. The thing that really made the difference at the end is really the bus drivers or do anything about the bullying so what made the difference was when the bus driver started getting fined and the first time a bus driver got fined, and he got fined about one month salary for letting bullying happen on his bus that is when it started to change. Its really funny because my friends in tel aviv, and i have a lot of them thought i was crazy. What are you talking about segregated buses in jerusalem . Thats ridiculous. I said do you want to come with me . They absolutely didnt believe me but the situation has gotten better, correct . At its height there were over 157 lines running through israel and since the freedom rides in the Supreme Court action in the finding of the bus traversed its no less than 50. So there is progress. There is definitely progress but its still there and theyre still tension around it and also sometimes when i traveled back, its right near the community of elite. Those buses are much more frequent in tel aviv than the other buses so every once in a while i find myself taking a bus from tel aviv that many are segregated. I could havent quite figured out how im supposed to know before you get on whether or not there is an expectation of segregation. Where do you sit when you get on that bus . I usually sit in the front. That was about two months ago. What happened . I have to admit i was a little anxious. Its really uncomfortable. Its really uncomfortable. You feel very stared at an unwanted and you are breaking all these codes. You shouldnt have to feel that way. You shouldnt have to feel like im a woman im wearing pants and sitting here where im not supposed to be. Imagine how rosa parks felt. Its a feeling of is the essence of who you are and you are not wanted in this space. Its very hard. Its very very hard. So we have made some progress and i do want to press the audience and let them know their challenges and opportunities and there have been successes. Lets talk about erasing womens public presence and what has happened in terms of women speaking at conferences and again the buses we will talk about the billboards and some examples and you tell an interesting story in the book. Okay, so there is this woman who is a very impressive woman. She spent 45 years working as a pediatric researcher, a lung researcher and hadassah hospital. She opened up a clinic for pediatric lung diseases. Very very impressive woman. The Health Ministry decided to give her a prize for her work only when the ceremony happened to give her the prize she wasnt allowed to go on stage. Somebody else went on stage to get her price. Why wasnt she allowed. Why was the geologic enterprise . Because she was a woman and they dont allow women on stage. Heres a woman who had 45 years of dedicated work but at the end none of that mattered. All that mattered was that she was a woman. Whats really frightening about this is this is not some private religious group. This is the government. So you really have to wonder what this all means. This isnt an isolated example. Their examples in and the post office is an hmo clinics and banks and libraries. Cemeteries. I think the most painful experience our womens exclusion from funerals where women cant go to deliver that doesnt happen everywhere but it happens in a lot of different places and its always sort of a surprise when somebody will come and say you know women this way or women cant go up to the front or women cant. Lets say a man and woman are mourning together and they are segregated in their morning. They collected stories that they collected a book of stories of women and their experiences of being segregated out of funerals of their loved ones. So theres a lawsuit happening and a lawsuit in the municipality over one of these women who have had that a devastating experience at the funeral of a loved one. Youve had the experience of funding. We funded posters that had womens images and they were immediately vandalized. So there were a couple of facets to the removal of women. What i just described was the physical removal of women. What you are describing is removal of their faces. We thought it was the Andrea Merkel thing. But this has been going on for many years and like the iconic figure of Hillary Rodham clinton at the assassination of Osama Bin Laden and she goes like this so that image was removed. She was erased out of that out of that picture so the array sure up womens pictures has taken place has already been taking place around the cities of jerusalem. Pictures have been removed from billboards to what happened is this group started a campaign which meant we wont be censored to try to get womens pictures back. The Bus Companies the Advertising Company which is responsible for all the billboards on the buses had an official policy which says we do not put pictures of women on the buses in jerusalem. Its not a religious company. Just a secular company. No pictures of women on buses of women. Government ministries were articulating this policy. You have the Education Ministry the Education Ministry where 75 of the workers are women and would have posters were outside jerusalem the posters had pictures of men but inside of jerusalem there were no posters of men. Men have separate ads inside of jerusalem and outside of jerusalem. Sometimes they would cut off the head of a woman and show them from the neck down because that was somehow better cutting off a womans head. The campaign worked very hard. They went to the Supreme Court and they also have this campaign of taking pictures of women and girls and women and girls in jerusalem were taking pictures of themselves and hanging them from the balconies. So the good news is that this campaign worked. Again this campaign was also supported by not only the removal of womens images was supported but the municipality had a marathon every year the jerusalem marathon and if you look at the jerusalem marathon pressures there were no pictures of women running on the web site site. This is the municipality. He is not a religious man. He was a secular man who agreed to do this to promote jerusalem a benz, secular jerusalem events like america to promote them without pictures of women. So through these campaigns and the Supreme Court and petitioning nearby eventually things were changed. Last year for the first time the jerusalem marathon had pictures of women and now of course a councilwoman in jerusalem is running the knesset now but last year she had to go to the Supreme Court to get the Supreme Court to agree to allow pictures on the buses. Finally when i won. Of course this is all illegal illegal. Even though there is no constitution theres a basic declaration of independence that stands in place. So its illegal and every time its brought to the Supreme Court the Supreme Court rules in favor women. Thank god we have the Supreme Court in israel and they are willing to balance it out. This modesty, these people who have decided that they make up these modesty squad to talk about that in the book and you talk about your own daughter. Share that example. She gets called names when she is wearing shorts. It wasnt just one incident. Happens a lot. She will get all kinds of she gets stared at. We discussed the idea and i want to talk a little bit about the power of the courts because i think its really been the Secular Forces in israel that has allow this to continue and it is also unfortunately undergirding some of the issues that we have cared a lot about for israels whole existence in marriage and divorce. The children of women and the whole experience of what happens to a woman because of the power of the women in the courts really. And the fact there are no women on the medical committee and that is changed a little with the councils. Talk to us a little because this is hopefully well get into abhorrent questions at the end. How is this looking . Is there hope for what is going to be and how have lawsuit helped or not help the situation and how do you see this as a womans issue . So the religious monopoly on marriage and divorce conversion is probably one of the greatest threats to womens basic civil rights in israel. You know the Rabbinical Court institution is probably perhaps one of the most sexist institutions and there are no women anywhere. Women cant be judges and women cant even work in the whole organization. Its based on very strict extreme interpretations of jewish law that really treats women very unfairly. Actually you have seen the movie get the movie get which i think has it ending i recommend everybody to see this movie to really understand the dynamics of what goes on in a religious court and how detached the courts are from basic human sensibilities, basic respect for women as human beings like a woman who walked into the Rabbinical Court is a complete lesser being. There is no problem with the judges telling her how she should dress and how she should talk and the assumptions how they talk to women are completely different. The fact the courts have this monopoly means that women dont have free exit power in marriage. Marriage is controlled based on the volition of men which is enforced by the allmale ultraorthodox statebacked Rabbinical Court so you have all these layers of control. You have tens of thousands of women who are stuck. They are stuck in limbo in the system that often can drag on for years. Women are subject to all kinds of extortion to try to gain their freedom. And that affects their children. I didnt know when my grandmother used to work, where it came from so these children who were totally innocent victims cant marry because they are one court keeps a secret blacklist of four of 5000 people who are not allowed to marry. Actually this woman is a rabbinic pleader is tracking this issue. She is leading the fight against the terrible harm we have done to people on this blacklist. So i highly wreck recommend everyone to look her up to learn more. No one stepped in the right direction that happened recently was requiring women, putting on women on the committees for the appointment of judges. Even though they are not on the Rabbinic Court itself there are women on the committees that pick the judges for their Rabbinic Courts. Thats an important first step. Having a woman actually work in a professional organization would also be a really important first step. There are a lot of women groups fighting for that as well. Ultimately the most important action to be taken to protect womens basic Civil Liberties in terms of personal status there has to be a separation at this point. There has to be a mechanism for civil marriage and civil divorce. There is this monopoly on womens rights and thats the issue with women. It doesnt even affect religious women. Not a matter of choice because its mandated by the state. That separation of religion is the most important step for the future of womens basic civil rights. We all know that it was a blind spot. Wonderful David Bengurion didnt quite vision we would be there. Thats a good way of putting it. I can say in our own country where we do have separation of religion and state, some people have forgotten that and think its the governments right to control womens bodies. We have taken a very active position in supporting a civil marriage or freedom to marry. Its not just civil marriage. Its not just about have a the civil marriage but having the ability to reform a conservative rabbi. If you dont happen to want to be a lot of people dont understand that and its something that there is a Broad Coalition of the Jewish Community concerned about this. Let me ask you this. The question that comes up for me in a lot of this is to what extent has the Secular Community been complicit . To what extent by not advocating for changes have non nonultraultraorthodox people capitulate and to alter orthodox and what its all about . The example of the jewish marathon it is not alter orthodox but somehow we have this idea that the right thing for him to do is to put womens pictures on the brochures or on the buses and the bus company is another example of the Advertising Company and buses are not a religious company. They think oh this is what our advertisers want or for example the president of israel when he was speaker of the house he made a decision not to allow women to sing at the knesset. We dont want to offend the sensibilities. Its okay if the sensibility is 50 of the population because they are just women but you cant offend the religious parties. If that kind of thinking, i dont want to offend those religious parties that is the most damaging to women. Its really just extremists who want that. It was proven with the story of this Radio Station and this is a really important story. The Radio Station is an alter orthodox Radio Station funded by the government does not allow women on the air. It doesnt allow women newsreaders, doesnt allow women in advertising. It doesnt allow women to call up and ask a question to the news presenter. If a woman wants to ask a question she asked if accident and it will be read by a man. So a bunch of womens groups got together and petitioned against it and said this is illegal. In this knesset hearing the business head of the Radio Station said what can you do this is what our clients want. So originally the government still said you have got to give women a few hours. At least give women for hours or six hours a week. They wouldnt live up to their agreements of the womens groups pushed more and push more and brownley said you are claiming that this is what your clients want but we dont think thats true. By the play when they say clients they mean men. Men only count as listeners. So what they did is the womens groups led by the orthodox feminist organization got together and they did a Market Research survey. They called up people who are regular listeners to the Radio Station and they did the work really well. They would say things like what program was on tuesday at 10 00 10 00 to make sure they got the real listeners and what they discovered do you want to hear women are dont you what they found 60 of the people wanted to hear women. So that i think is a really important point. Did it change . So what happened was the womens groups sued for 100 million shekels and about two months ago they won. It had a huge precedence but it was based on this idea that this isnt what people want. Its not even what the group wants. So Business Leaders and political leaders who were secular said secular Business Leaders have this perception that in order to appease the community they have to exclude women. But its not what the Community Wants either. So before we opened up we want to talk about some opportunities. I want to segue into a positive. Talk to me little bit about what kind of collaborations exist between religious feminist and human rights activists. Not everyone understands their people within the religious community who are beginning to speak out particularly women but some men to and what is the relationship . For example the type of work the ncjw has been doing like the freedom rides it seems like because it was the ncjw and collaboration with groups like religious feminist groups that this sends a very powerful message about what we are talking about here. Its a religious issue. Its a feminist issue. Its a civil rights issue. Its all of them together. They also have convened several roundtables which ask consist of 20 or 30 or stations. Have our feminist religious organizations and half the groups around the table are secularist civil rights types of organizations. That collaboration is helpful. For instance with the Radio Station the victory was collaboration between the religious feminist group and Action Center which is the Reform Movement and civil rights. Those collaborations are crucial crucial. It cant just beat, they cant just becoming from and the religious feminist groups although i think they also play key role in leading the change from within. The religious feminist groups are basically saying this is not religion and not the way religion is supposed to be but its only with the collaboration with the secular civil rights that it becomes powerful that you get change happening. I think we have had a series of these over the buses and Radio Stations. Appoints to the power of advocates and activists for change. That is what we have been doing at ncjw for 20 years and solomon founded in 1893. We have been trying to organize jewish women to make change in the world through the international of jewish women doing it internationally. There are examples. More than once they have intervened in these situations. Its a start. We have been involved in u. N. Resolution 1325 which are peacemaking committees. Finally we have gotten us. I think there is a connection and change from an all around. There has been a steady increase of women in the knesset over the past decade. Still only 26 women in the knesset which is up 120 which is still pretty low. In the last two knesset i would say its not just that the number of women have increased that the number of women with feminist consciousness have increased so that has brought a lot of these issues to the knesset and much more powerful ways and that is created a whole slew of activism. So you have activism in the Judicial Branch and the legislative branch and then of course on the ground and the grassroots. When it comes from these Different Directions it is also really important but having some really strong feminist legislators has been really invaluable. That is why its so important because we know when there are more women around the table you have more solutions. Its a different approach to decisionmaking. Before i conclude and open it up for audience questions talk to us about the neatly fill up story. This is the most recent victory which is its not just that there are signs on the streets as they women cant walk here. They have signs on the street that they women have to dress a certain way and its enforced by violence. You have these different violent thugs that throw rocks and other things that women for not being dress the right way were walking in the wrong place. She is an american woman. She was riding her bike down the street and she was hit in the head with a rock. So she got together with a few other women who were also hurt by these squads and together they brought a lawsuit to hold the municipality responsible to say if you have signs in your city that say women arent allowed here or that women have to be dressed a certain way it violates laws so you are responsible. The lawsuit has been going on for about two years i think and there were some difficult. Because the mayor said some really obnoxious things basically saying that the women dont really count. Again i cant offend men. Its okay to offend women because we are just women but the mayor said the same thing. I cant offend my constituents. Women are constituents too by the way. And vote. So after this twoyear lawsuit last week, two weeks ago i mean the courts came down in favor of the women and they ruled in favor of the women and they ruled that the municipality has to pay the women. Now we are waiting to see. We have 30 days to remove the signs so we are in the middle of 30 days of waiting to see if they are going to take down the signs. If the municipality is forced to take down the signs that the huge president and a message for the rest of israel to say its not okay to have assigned anywhere in israel that says women are not allowed here. Women cant walk into this clinic if they are not dressed in a particular way. They cant do that. So its really Important Court decision. And thats recent. This is happening now and all shifting now. Thats awesome. Before we open it up i want to just conclude with elanas own words. In the book is worth getting and reading completely if you havent already. This is really important because elana is not antireligion and this is not about being against ultra. Orthodox or ultraorthodox but about womens rights have been equal status in israel. At the conclusion of the books elana says i want to be clear. Im not suggesting to anyone who is religious not to be religious. On the contrary. I believe religion can be a beautiful thing. Religious life can provide connection, meaning, purpose community, structure tradition, heritage, care responsibility and so much more. She goes on to describe why she is a believer and the essence of religion and above all it should guide us to be better. Too deeply care about the state of humanity and work to improve it. After all that is what religion is supposed to do. The problem she says in conclusion is so much of what is given to us under the guise of religiousness is just not actually religious at all. Whether its a muslim cleric a conservative american political candidate trying to control womens reproductive rights within antiabortion platform or an arabian man spitting at a young woman on a bus. There were people on in the world who claim to represent or do things in the name of religion but who simply are not. This is fundamentally not what used to be religious. So thank you elana. Its very beautiful. I want to thank elana for coming here from israel. Thank you so much. [applause] we would like to open it up and see if you would like to raise any questions about anything we have talked about or anything else. Hold on. I just have to get the microphone. I have a question about the funeral situation. Is this individual rabbis versus allin jerusalem . I cant really grasp that. Israel the funerals are controlled by the fiducia which is the organization and statebacked. Its a state institution. Its within the religious ministry. There is such a thing in israel as is a religious ministry which controls things like that. Its hard in america to wrap your head around that. We are not talking about it much right now. We can talk about that either but right so that khadijah this state salaried but in each city they manage and run funerals but they have their own city municipal staffs and practices. Its not just jerusalem. These stories have happened elsewhere and its a little bit random. Hard to know exactly which cities this will be taking place. Also the funeral is such a vulnerable situation you are in. Its not something that you necessarily have planned or researched or investigated the way you do save her wedding. I think bush is asking is that a particular rabbi who was doing the criminal . Rabbis dont do funerals. Its not that a rabbi does a funeral. You go to a cemetery and run the funeral and you have cuday shows around. So its random. Right. Does that answer your question . Other questions . Right over there. There was another question. I came in late so you might have answered part of this but maybe not all of it. Are women allowed to be lawyers before the court so a woman can represent another woman . Can you elaborate without being overly repetitious the status of women in the Supreme Court . A secular Supreme Court . The secular Supreme Court has a pretty good record on women. A woman chief justice. Exactly. But thats separate from their Rabbinical Courts. They are two totally separate tracks. There is something called the race to the courthouse because even though you can only finalize their divorce in their Rabbinical Court system you can actually do Everything Else in the Family Court System and sort of show up to their Rabbinical Court. You can go to a family court where you negotiate custody and all the iterations of divorce and go to their Rabbinical Court and say i think we are ready to begin the process. A lot of women getting divorced like to do that. They like to go to the Secular Court system where they have fair treatment because a lot of studies have shown women get fair treatment in the secular family courts than the Rabbinical Courts. You can only open up your Divorce Proceedings in one place. You can only file for divorce in one place. There is a race to the courthouse. The men are running to their Rabbinical Court and women are running to the Secular Courts because they know they will get better treatment there. Actually a lot of hotlines like Domestic Abuse hotlines in israel always say if you are thinking about getting divorced keep it secret for a while because you have got to get to the courthouse first and then tell your husband and file. Is the true if they get all the paperwork done to the Secular Court officially they dont get at the Rabbinic Courts they are not divorced whereas in the United States were to get or not you are still divorced. There is no such thing as civil marriage and no such thing as civil towards. [inaudible] dont have anything to say about it. He really is completely two separate systems. They may not be the same as the Supreme Court. And they dont go to the Supreme Court to resolve their issues. They go to their rabbinic work. The Rabbinical Courts dont answer to anyone. They answered to their own rules. There is no real accountability in any form. Theres plenty they can do to change it and there is legislation introduced to change it. It hasnt yet gotten there. We hope eventually it will and there is a lot of efficacy going on. One of the issues we didnt touch on that relates to this is conversion. I know its a complex issue but also impacts on official conversion. Absolutely. I would like to add about the knesset that this last knesset session is the first time in 30 years that there was a coalition without religious parties in it. It won 19 mandates in the last election because it read on this platform is trying to separate religion and state and he was really the first one in a very long time in the coalition to say we dont want in the ultraorthodox parties. It was over bennetts rabbinic but in this upcoming election on march 17 its going to be real interesting to see how much power this antireligious platform gets how much power this idea that we need a government without religious parties how much power thats going to have. Having a coalition without religious parties and that i think is really crucial to be able to pass the legislation. What we have found is until and unless the israeli Secular Society sees this in their selfinterest as an issue that they care about, a lot of people like to say this is an american issue. This isnt an israel issue issue. More and more its seen as an israel issue. Why . Because we have so many people are trying to get married in israel. We have all the russians whether they are jewish or not jewish. So i think there is a growing sense, and were formative presence. So growing sense within Israeli Society that theres too much control and religion is playing too big of a role. We should remember the synagogue that the israelis dont go to is the orthodox synagogues so they havent cared that much but now they have alternatives. Other points or questions . One minute, hes going to bring you the microphone. Question. Is the airline subsidized by the state of israel . Or is it entirely a private company . Its a government corporation. Its not what it used to be. It used to be a piece of the government but it spends a lot of time separating out settling out pieces of the government. Privatizing. Quasi. Elana i wanted to know, i havent read your book yet but im planning to read it. Thank you. What happened with this seat on the airline . And did the Airline Staff support you and how did they react . To answer the last question first the staff didnt get involved but in previous times the staff to get involved. The staff tried to accommodate women who have trouble sitting next to men. This happened in september. It wasnt the first time it happened to me. It was just the first time ive blogged about it. It happened to me as well. If you want to put me in first class i will be glad to move my seat. Reads my blog about it what i decided to do is a something i had never done before. The reason why decided to speak out is because i didnt want to be a hypocrite credited and want to say a go i want to come to places like this and talk about gentrification when its happening in their people doing it to me making me feel like a lesser person. I felt wrong so the guy was running up and down the aisle for 20 or 30 minutes. I was watching this happen and puttering and talking to his friends. There were 15 or 20 minute round. It was two days before rosh hashanah. I dont know what it was actually. So im watching this happen and the whole time i have all of these thoughts bubbling up in my head of things that i really would like to say but im holding my tongue. Finally right before he found somebody else to sit next to me i said come and Say Something. I decided to speak up. I had to two while he was puttering having in internal dialogue about what i should do about this. So i decided to Say Something and i wanted to frame it in a way that he would be able to understand. So i said how would you feel if instead of men and women we were talking about jewish and nonjewish and how would you feel if you are sitting here and a whole bunch of nonjewish say i cant sit next to you, no offense. No offense its just that you will cause me sin or you are an pure. You are really at a higher level of course i like cant talk to because it turns my thoughts thoughts bad or its against my religion. Whatever it is you are going to try to say its not going to work. As soon as i started talking all of these men including him turn their backs on me. Im seeing this wall of black backs and that i have to admit was the hardest part. Suddenly its dehumanizing. You just feel like you are not a person. So i stopped talking and i sat back and i was looking at the window. I actually started to cry. I dont know why. They just come back from this two and a half week had these different talks and i was traveling around and you are confronted with this reality and it was really so difficult. It was just so difficult. I wrote this little blog and i knew it wasnt going to go viral viral. Once i did, its out there. That was my reality at the time. But i still did not get a call. Im waiting for a call for them to say what you like a free cup of coffee or something . I was a really good flyer. I was coming to new york six or seven times a year at least. I would think they would notice that i thought they would say heres a really good customer. Did you write them a letter . I wrote them so many letters. I wrote them so many times. That is when i realized the reason flight attendants listen to the jury demand is the man act as a bloc. One rabbi gets up and says you cant fly anymore the whole group does it but we as women havent found that power yet. That is what organizing is all about. Are there other questions or comments from the audience . Up there in the back. This is the last question. There is one there and one there. I cant see. There was one right back there. I just wanted to comment that the synagogue i go to in long island is currently evaluating whether or not whether they should become egalitarian. Right now they have kind of like a compromise solution where some people want to see it separately and some want to sit together but it occurs to me that if im really unhappy with the decision they reach i can find myself an egalitarian synagogue and go wherever it happens to be. I just visited israel in november and even then i was and is aware of some of these things happening around me. I can imagine how it must be living in a society that are battling for these kinds of rights after all these years. Just confounds me that this kind of stuff still goes on. We live in a society where we have our Supreme Court telling women the italian corporations that they are corporations and they can deny womens rights to contraceptive access. Unfortunately im sorry to say its not just in israel. Its also right here in our country. Corporations are people is what the decision was about and thats a very scary thing thing. There will be several cases coming out. I dont want to conclude without saying we are concerned. Is this the entire Israeli Society . No of course not but there are signs of something happening that we didnt see 20 30, 40 years ago in Israeli Society. Part of it is because of the growing influence and numbers. Its a pure demographic issue. Both by the way with the orthodox and we didnt mesh with mention the Muslim Community because its in both. Its not just jewish who cant marry in a civil ceremony. Christian and muslims cant marry in a civil ceremony. They have to marry according to their own religious courts. Its a much bigger issue. Its a flaw without a constitution of us ever been fixed. Even though the intent was dated in that declaration of independence which is why began with the declaration of independence. Its a flaw in the democracy and we can be proud of this democracy. Its still the only democracy in the middle east lets remember. Its a whole lot better than it is in other countries that surround israel where women cant drive and women cant walk down the street without being fully covered. I want to be careful that we put it in perspective is something we care deeply about them we will continue to fight around. Its not all negative and its not pervasive. In tel aviv or haifa you would know that this was an issue but there are signs that are concerning to those of us who celebrate democracy and want to celebrate israel as a Jewish Democratic state. I want to thank you all and i want to thank elena for coming. Really appreciate it and thank the museum of jewish heritage for having us and for sponsoring us. [applause] thank you both for this illuminating conversation. On a commercial note there are books available in the lobby and im sure the lawn i will be happy to sign. Thanks for coming. [applause]